


Lost Happy Endings

by AmeliaAsherWrites



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe: LOST, Canon Shipping, Crossover, Lost AU, Monsters, Multi, This will get dark, Violence, many major character deaths, not many happy endings, takes place in 2004
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-22
Packaged: 2019-06-20 21:35:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 35,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15542640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmeliaAsherWrites/pseuds/AmeliaAsherWrites
Summary: Once Upon a Time Crossover AU with ABC's Lost.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Some OUAT characters assume two roles from Lost. You do not need to be familiar with Lost at all to be able to follow this because there are only OUAT characters in this story. If you did watch, you may recognize familiar lines, but these similarities will lessen as the story unfolds. I do not presume to claim ownership of any of the characters, OUAT or LOST. I do not plan to make this a six-season AU story here, but will include major events. Expect OUAT canon ships in unlikely Lost personalities, but the crossover fits well here. Some non-canon OUAT 'acts' will happen and I will adjust the rating and tags when appropriate. 
> 
> Buckle up and put your tray tables in the upright and locked position! This is going to be a dark flight with very few happy endings. I'm warning you now. If that's not your thing, consider reading something else. :)  
> -AA

[](https://ibb.co/dYPyrK)

**David**

With a gasp, David opened his eyes. Was he dead? There was pain. No, not yet. He was laying down, evidently, as he breathed the humid air. His fingers felt the sticky leaves around him as he focused to notice bamboo shoots surrounding him. He’d fallen into a bamboo forest? This made no sense as his mind raced trying to understand. The last thing he remembered was the thinking he was going to die as he braced for impact.

A motion to his left took his attention away from his confusion and pain. It was a dog. A black labrador whimpered as it ran low towards him. David blinked as he thought the dog would run over his face, but at the last moment, it changed direction and continued its frantic trek between the bamboo trees.

It was time to get up. He had to figure out what had happened. He stood by pulling himself up on the nearest bamboo and moaned with the shooting pain lancing up his side. Touching his white dress shirt, the pain reverberated through his body again as he felt the wetness. Blood. He’d been cut deep. His other hand pulled the little airline bottle of vodka from his jacket pocket. His surgeon’s mind was already running through the checklist on treating and fixing the wound. Alcohol would keep him from getting infected. He just needed a first aid kit. 

A cry somewhere in the distance caught his ear. The other passengers! He wasn’t alone! But where the hell was he? He ran. Past the trees that whipped at his face and closer to the sound of the ocean’s waves, closer to screaming of people and a single screaming plane engine he ran. 

His heart was pumping so loud he could hear that in his ears too, but he’d never been one to run away from people in need. He’d been called a hero before and though he’d balk at the title, this was no time to delay, injured or not. So he ran. 

Breaking through the trees and onto the sandy beach, his breath was still coming in pants as he stared at the ocean, vast and endless across the horizon. The screaming persisted, so he looked to his left to see the engine he’d heard still turning and on fire. There were people on the beach, some dead, some crying, and so many wounded. Smoke and debris littered the beach and the air. Sparks flew from the torn plane. It was a nightmare. He clutched his ears against the screaming, unsure at the moment what to do first. 

A man stood too close to an engine as it continued to spin. A girl screamed. The ruined fuselage creaked and shot sparks from the remaining electrical system. Someone else continued screaming for help. A man directly below the engine and half crushed by metal was crying out. David ran to him first waving others forward to help lift the metal while he dragged the man away. He ripped his own tie off and began wrapping it around the man’s bloodied leg and yelled directions at those who helped. 

A pregnant woman was screaming as she clutched her belly. He ran to her next asking her how far along she was. Breathing heavily and blinking through tear-streaked mascara, she told him eight months but was unsure of how far apart her contractions were. Just then, the screaming engine exploded as the man who had just been saved was sucked into it. 

Another man nearby was trying to perform CPR on an unconscious woman. David recognized her from the plane. He grabbed the nearest person who was standing around looking lost and told him to stay by the pregnant woman. “Call me if her contractions are faster than three minutes apart!” He yelled. The noise of the beach was so loud, yelling was the only option. 

“Wha-,” the tall fellow said in confusion. “You’ve gotta be kidding me…” His voice trailed off as he looked at the woman who panted in the sand. “Hey!” He yelled realizing David was running off again. “What’s your name?”

“David!” he shouted over his shoulder, then ran to approach the young, bearded man who had been trying and failing to blow into the unconscious woman’s mouth. “You’re blowing air into her stomach at that angle.” Adjusting the woman’s head and pinching her nose, David blew into her mouth.

“I’ve been doing wildlife tours and CPR for years,” the baffled man said as David pumped the woman’s sternum. His accent marked him as British. “I’m licensed.”

“Yeah? Well, you ought to give that license back!” David shot back as he pinched the woman’s nose again and blew. Just as David was beginning to panic that he was too late, the woman sputtered and gasped in air, her eyes flying open. David grinned in relief. 

Another ear-splitting screech of metal warping and straining under its own weight behind him and David wrenched himself around to see a ripped part of the plane that had been suspended in the air was beginning to waver. It was going to fall!

He jumped up and ran back to where the pregnant woman and the tall, heavy man were crouched. They were directly in the path of the metal. “Move!” David yelled as he ran as fast as he could towards them. “Move! Move! Get her out of there!” 

They both screamed. The men each grabbed an arm of the woman and ran with her just in time as the metal fell. It struck another piece of metal and an instant inferno engulfed the area they had just been standing. The three of them fell as the fireball zoomed past them, but they survived. Again.

 

His ears were ringing as he continued along the beach. Part of the plane’s cabin was just ahead. Seats were visible as the plane sat on its side. A hand hung down lifelessly from one of the seats further back. He gripped his head and winced as he looked away briefly. David was no stranger to death, but the inability to help more was overwhelming. 

Suitcases littered the beach. Would any of these be claimed by their rightful owners or was it all fair game? Did it matter anymore? He had to believe it would. The pain in his side reminded him that he needed a first aid kit. Despite the invasion of privacy by rummaging through the luggage, he had to search. The first one he opened proved to have a small sewing kit within. Not for skin, but for fabric. But it held needle and thread and it would have to do. 

Lumbering towards the trees again for some privacy, he noticed his breathing was still much too fast. Adrenaline would make him bleed more. Of course. He knew that, but he wasn’t dead like so many upon the beach. Shucking his suit jacket, then his shirt, he knelt down into the sand trying to get a better look. It was too far back for him to reach. 

A movement through the trees caught his attention, however. And the sight he saw baffled him. “Dad?” he whispered with incredulity. He squeezed his eyes tightly shut and shook his head. _Dad is dead. He’s been dead for a week._ Opening his eyes again, the brightness of the sun had peeked through the clouds to send a ray of light through the trees directly into David’s face. He raised a hand, further causing him to wince from moving the torn flesh of his back. The figure in the distance was walking away from him. “Hey!” David shouted again as he began to stand. It made no sense to him. He had to be hallucinating.

The figure stepped behind a tree. “Wait!” And then a woman stepped out from behind the palm trees. “Excuse me!” he said again through labored breaths. 

“Excuse you!” she declared righteously looking down her nose at him as he slumped back to his knees.. She huffed, looked him up and down as if to size him up, and must have disregarded him as if unworthy of her time, but David grabbed her arm over her torn pants suit jacket before she could stomp away.

“Wait,” he breathed. “Do you ever use a needle?”

The woman glared at his hand on her arm as if he wasn’t worth touching her royal flesh and flung his hand off. “Why? Because I’m a woman?”

Nevertheless, David persisted. “I need a little help here. I’m bleeding. I need stitches.”

“Then find yourself a doctor!” she declared, ready to stomp away. 

But David interrupted her immediately before she could. “I’m a doctor, a surgeon actually, but I can’t stitch this myself.”

“Congratulations,” the woman interrupted sourly. 

“Please. You can do this. I’ll owe you.” He shook his head, his blue eyes beseeching her help. “Please.”

Something broke in the tough woman’s facade as her lip wobbled and her breath caught in her throat. David realized in that instant that her hostility towards him was a mask. She was terrified and rightly so. She’d just survived something no one should experience. “Please. If you wouldn’t mind…” He was so out of breath, it was all he could do to plead with her on his knees. 

She looked at the sewing kit in his hands before she blinked heavily to fight the moisture building in her brown eyes, and shook her head. “Of course,” she whispered. “This isn’t surgical grade. This looks like something that would stitch on a button.” She took the kit carefully as she eyed each of the kit’s components with its multitude of colorful bobbins and assorted needles.

“Thank you.” He handed her the airline bottle of vodka too and she looked at it in confusion, traces of her hostility flaring up again, but he spoke up. “It’s for your hands, but save me some. For the wound.” He gestured feebly towards his bloodied side.

“Any color preference?” she asked tightly after spilling half the bottle upon her fingers. 

David chuckled and took the bottle back from her when she was finished. “Standard black,” he said as he raised his injured side’s arm to pour the remainder of the alcohol on his cut which caused him to wince and huff out breath as it burned his flesh. 

“I can do this. I can,” she whispered to herself as she watched the blood run down to his black trousers. 

“Sure you can,” he smiled up at her. “I’m David.”

 

“Regina,” she said as she knelt down beside him and focused on the wound. “I might be sick,” she said minutes later after pushing the needle through his flesh.

“You’re doing fine,” he said with bared teeth. He’d attempted a reassuring smile to make it easier on her to proceed, but it hurt. 

“Why aren’t you afraid?” Regina asked behind him. 

“Fear is an odd thing. I’ve made terrible mistakes in the face of terror, but I only let it in for five seconds. Only five seconds and then I had to push it aside and take over. Fear was gone. I went back to work, did my job, and my patient was fine.” 

Regina stuck the needle in again. “If it was me… I don’t know what I would have done. Maybe ran.”

David shook his head and smiled easier. “You’re not running now.”

**Gold**

His head was spinning as he came to. The angle was all wrong. Blinking took a long time. Opening his eyes again minutes later, he looked forward and saw only a few blue seats with palm branches surrounding him. _Why is there a tree in the plane?_ He wondered but could not focus long enough to come to a logical reason. 

Something was digging into his hip. Glancing down at it, another wave of dizziness accompanied the movement of his head. Not drunk. Plane crash. “Oh gods!” he mumbled in sudden terror and remembrance. Fumbling with the latch at his hip, he managed to flip it forward releasing the catch. Where were the other passengers? Where was his boy? “Neal?” His voice cracked with strain. Where was the rest of the plane? Where was his wheelchair? They had taken it to store somewhere forward in the cabin after he’d been seated, but the entire front of the plane had been ripped off to show naught but trees past the seats. Crippled, alone, and trapped? A whimper of fear escaped his lips. 

Leaning ever so slightly to his side, he could see just how far up from the ground he was perched. 

But he had to get out. “Help!” he cried in case anyone was near him. “Help!” he tried again, but he was alone.

His heart was racing, his hands shook, but he had to move. This was no time to be a coward. He’d crawl and climb down from the tree if he had to get to Neal. “I’m not going to die from a plane crash after it’s already landed,” he decided. “Neal! I’ll find you, son!” 

Something tickled his knee and he jerked it in reflex. There was always an expectation to feel pain in that leg when he moved it too quickly without regard to the old injury, but upon tightening his muscles to guard against the sure effects of pain, he stopped. Relaxing slightly, he made a quick assessment of his limbs. The right leg? No, right leg is fine. Had he damn well forgotten which leg had been bothering him so badly he couldn’t walk some days? To be sure, he moved his right leg raising it and wiggling it back and forth. The left leg again. 

“What?” he whispered to himself. This made no sense. Where was the pain? No, he was not dreaming. He had certainly not dreamed being so incapacitated, he could barely walk without debilitating pain radiating up his leg and into his hip and spine. A laugh escaped his lips. What magic was this? It was a miracle! He grabbed the seat back in front of him and pulled himself to standing with the broadest grin on his face he’d had in longer than he could remember, but tensed as the ruined metal beneath his feet shifted with a groan in the tree. 

“Help!” he cried again. There was no stalling. He had to jump or die and he chose life. 

The impact knocked the wind out of him, but he was alive. 

Flopping to his back, he stared up at the sky, half obliterated by the palm canopy. His face broke into a laugh, the only sound he heard besides the creaking of the shifting plane. 

 

After a while, he knew he had to look for Neal. There was no other option but to think him still alive. He was out there somewhere. He took a few tentative steps, fully expecting to cry out and fall on hands and knees any minute now, but the minute never came. 

“I don’t understand,” he mused to himself and he watched his feet as he walked. He laughed loudly and walked faster. He even took to jogging but only for a few steps because he hadn’t been able to properly exercise in some time.

Where was this amazing place he’d found himself? Grinning, Gold spun around in a circle. “Neal!” he cried towards the sky. “If only you were here right now, my boy!” And the joy seeped into grief as Gold sunk to his knees thinking the worst must be true. Tears streamed down his face. “I can walk again, Neal. I can walk.” Grinning, despite the tears, he touched the sand between his fingers. 

No more jobs which he couldn’t do, no more pain, no more people who would look at him in pity as he hobbled with a cane or used a chair when the pain got to be too much. No more of that weak man. The coward. 

This island had given him back his leg and his life. It must be magical, he was sure. But at the price of his son’s life, he hoped he was wrong.

**Killian**

The plane went down with a screaming hiss. Half broke off into the ocean, half broke off into the trees of the island. Amongst the wailing of the the survivors scattered along the beach, this was the only news Killian could decipher through the tears and wailing of his fellow survivors. His ears still rung from the screaming of not only the engine but the people as the plane hurled towards the island. Breaking in half in mid air… how was this possible? He could not guess. He had always been more fond of sea travel than air, but the journey from Australia to California was too far to go by ship and his bandmates would never have fancied such a journey by sea. Now where were they? Gone? Dead? He was the only one to have survived, it seemed.

Killian stumbled over a facedown body in the sand of the beach, and past a heavy-set man with curly hair muttering a series of numbers to himself as he approached a blonde, pregnant woman who was wailing as she clutched the bulge of her belly. Pregnant and survived this? He wondered as his eyes flashed wide in mingled shock and wonder. Shaking his head to get out of his stupor, he jogged to the woman. Mascara had streaked down her cheeks and dried at some point, but she wasn’t crying any longer. “Ah,” he stumbled for words as he looked in horror at her belly. “Is it your time, love?” he asked. 

The woman stopped turned from the tall giant of a man for a moment to look at Killian in bewilderment. A boom from the distance nearly made Killian duck for cover again, but he was too far away to be affected.

The woman said something, but Killian had to slap his ear as he winced at her. “I think I’ve got the bloody tinnitus. Can ya say that again, love?”

As she listened to him, a quick grin flashed across the woman’s face, contrasting with the streaking mascara and the sudden frown that returned just a moment later. “I’m Emma!” she yelled. 

“Killian!” he shouted back. Was the noise still persisting or were his ears shot to hell? He wasn’t sure. “Is the baby alright?” he asked again, pointing at her belly.

She frowned and looked down at it between them. “It’s… it’s just feeling wrong. I don’t know!”

He helped her to sit against the sand and sat beside her talking to her, hoping to distract her while some still cried, others looted luggage and some died. The least he could do was distract and comfort one person.

**Jefferson**

He lit the Zippo lighter with a casual flick of his thumb and brought the flame toward the end of the pilfered cigarette hanging from his lips until the tip bloomed a cherry red. The screaming had dwindled down just enough that Jefferson could lean back against the ruined shell of the plane without his nerves making him twitch. For now, he watched as he took a deep drag from the cigarette and closed his eyes against the setting sun. 

It still wasn’t enough. He had to pace for a while in the sand as he watched people in the distance scrounging through luggage, some helping others, some still crying over the dead. What did any of that matter? They were dead. They were trapped. This island was in the middle of nowhere. They were all trapped. What good were they doing fretting and screaming? 

The cigarette helped. He hadn’t had one in years. Raising one hand to his lips, he barely felt the tremor that coursed through his hand as he took another long draw. 

When the cigarette was done, he tossed it into the sand with regret. It was the only one he found amongst the detritus on the beach. There would be more somewhere and he’d find them. 

He stalked past a small group of people contemplating their chances, _suckers,_ past a very pregnant woman who stood with her bare feet in the shallowest of the ocean's breakers, past the few people that were smiling. 

Someone collided with him from behind grasping the back of his shirt. Jefferson tensed at the contact as the shorter man with strained, panic-filled eyes clasped his hands together as if in prayer. "Please! Help me! My boy! I can't find him!" His head darted to the side looking out across the beach, eyes searching. 

"Woah, woah," Jefferson said frowning down at the man. It took some effort, but Jefferson set his hand on the man's shoulder. It was what normal people did for those in crisis. "What's he look like? How old?" 

"He's... he's only ten. Brown hair. Yea tall." He held his hand up at a height almost as tall as himself. "Please. I'm all he has left!" 

"And all you have left, too," Jefferson hazarded the guess as he couldn't help but think of Grace.

The man frowned only briefly at him. Sure, it could have been taken as a rude remark, but Jefferson dipped his head briefly in a nod before forcing a smile for the other man's benefit. "I've been watching the beach for hours. I saw a boy like that. Come with me. I'll show you."

Jefferson thought for a moment the man was going to fall in sheer relief, but he managed to keep his legs in the sand as he walked, shaking beside him. "Thank you," he breathed. 

"Where'd you come from?" Jefferson asked, trying for some conversation, anything to distract the man from his trembling or he might actually fall.

"Uh... Glasgow," he said with a quick glance away from the bonfire ahead and up at Jefferson. "We were in Australia because... because there was a doctor... that could have fixed my leg."

Jefferson frowned down at his leg, but through the pant leg, he couldn't tell anything was wrong. Maybe he had an artificial leg. "You seem alright to me."

The man nodded vigorously and ran a hand back through his long hair. The shaking seemed to be lessening. "It was a scam. A con. He didn't fix anything. Lost everything I had." 

"Except your son?" Jefferson added quickly with a gesture towards him for confirmation. He knew cons too well, but discussing that wasn't going to help the guy's nerves and Jefferson didn't want to encourage any subject that might lead to divulging of anything personal of his own.

"Y... Yes." His thumb was worrying over his pointer finger, maybe a method of anxiety relief, but his focus remained on the fire ahead. 

"We'll find him," Jefferson said quietly, and very carefully reached out to pat the shorter man's back in encouragement. "What's your name? And your son's?"

"I'm... Gold. Robert Gold. And my son is Neal." He smiled again though Jefferson was sure he saw a hint of wetness in the man's eyes. 

Jefferson nodded, taking in the information. He'd learned a lot in one day. Just as the sun began to dip below the horizon, the faces surrounding the bonfire became more clear. "The name's Jefferson. Nice to meet you, Gold." It wasn't a lie. It was good to actually have a conversation with someone. To help, even. 

"Look there," Jefferson raised a hand to point at the shortest member of the fire circle. Brown, touseled hair, the boy couldn't be more than ten. He was talking to a woman that had refused food earlier earlier, foolish woman. She nudged the boy playfully with a grin and the boy shifted to reveal a side profile. 

"Neal!" Gold gasped as he nearly fell once again in shock. Jefferson looped a hand under his arm to hold him up, but the man had found his footing just as the boy turned to face them. 

"Papa!" Neal yelled and ran to his father for the embrace.

Jefferson stood back and didn't approach. None of them really mattered. Only one person mattered in the entire world and she wasn’t here on the damned island.

**Emma**

The pain was still too much. Even a couple hours after crash landing and the baby was struggling within her belly as it twisted and jabbed her in the bladder. If this was labor, she did not want to go through this on a fucking island. Unsanitary, no hospital, but… one doctor at least. What the hell was she going to do!? “I’m going to die here,” she said softly with her eyes wide as she looked straight at the ocean. Part of the plane had gone down in the ocean, people were saying. Where? It wasn’t even in sight. Had it already sunk? Were all of those people dead? The only thing anyone knew for sure was that they had all come from the half of the plane that had just blown up an hour ago. If that doctor hadn’t made her move, she and the baby would be dead. Twice she’d survived in the span of two hours. 

Another spasm of pain shot up her back and sent spider webs of aftershocks across her lower belly. “Ahhhhh,” she moaned clutching the sides of the mass. “I don’t want to die on an island!”

“Shh, you won’t. You won’t,” the dark haired, eye-linered, blue eyed guy at her side assured. _Oh. He’s back,_ she realized as she cast a tense look his way.

“How the hell would you know?” Emma asked, but without any heat. She could tell he was worried about her even if he didn’t know her from any of these other people. 

“Is it your first?” he asked with a faint smile. 

She eyed him. How did he guess that? Maybe all first time mothers think they’re dying? Emma had no clue about that either. 

If she had bothered to read any of the _Expecting_ books, maybe she would know what the hell she was supposed to expect, what these pains were, if it was labor, and on and on, but she didn’t want this baby. In fact, she was headed to California to give up the damn baby to a family that actually wanted him. But here she was crashed and abandoned on an island! 

Her face fell into her hands as she tried to conceal the emotion she was feeling. Never one to be too emotional, Emma hated when her body betrayed her. 

“There there,” the man said again. He was becoming too attentive and it was annoying. 

“Can you just…” Should she tell him to fuck off? No. He was too nice. Maybe… “Can you… find me some medicine? Like antacid or… I don’t know. Tylenol? Acetaminophen? Some food?”

His expression went blank for only a moment before a brilliant grin crossed his face again. “Yeah. I can look for it.” He scrambled up immediately, eager to look. Maybe he’d get lost. She had no time or patience for puppies, even if they were attractive. Seriously, what kind of guy these days wears eyeliner? She wanted to ask him, but she was at such a loss for how to word it without sounding like a bitch, she kept it to herself. Maybe he was a goth or.. Or a pothead or something. Didn’t really matter. He’d gone off and now she had the peace to get up and move elsewhere among the survivors. 

It took some effort to stand. “Damn it. I shouldn’t have waited this long,” she grumbled as she used the shell of the plane to get her feet. There were two people sitting up ahead consoling each other. “Nope.” Keeping her feet moving, she was looking for somewhere she could go to be alone. Plane survivors or not, she had little interest in getting to know these people. Surely, some rescue teams would be coming to find them. Planes had GPS beacons built in them right? The black box… thing? Someone would come…

The wing was half buried in sand. No one seemed too inclined to be near it since the last explosion, but this one was making no noises. It was the perfect place to sit on a flat surface that wasn’t sand. “Thank god,” she moaned as she sunk on to the smooth surface and closed her eyes. The sun was starting to go down. The humidity of the afternoon was starting to lessen. 

She hadn’t had a full minute to herself, when her seat shifted, the metal groaned with added weight and the tall, giant man that helped her and the doctor get away from the falling plane had joined her. “Hey!” he said cheerfully. “You hungry?” 

“Uh, yeah. Actually, I am,” Emma breathed as she eyed the metal box in his hands. It was full of airplane meals she hadn’t been able to afford while on the plane. 

“I’m Anton,” he said as he picked up an aluminum foil covered tray and a plastic wrapped fork and napkin and put them in her hands. “Well, see ya around.” He stood and walked off to give someone else food too, she guessed.

“Emma,” she said quietly to herself, but he’d gone before he could hear her. As she fiddled with the utensil packaging, he came back to give her an extra one. 

“For the baby, Emma,” he whispered, and she smiled.

**Regina**

The sun had gone down. Small fires crackled along the beach as the survivors waited to be found. No one she could see sat alone. People kept warm around the fires, but the night wasn’t cold. It was more for security. To be seen by the rescue team that was surely coming. If they were coming. 

David sat at her right. His face was scratched showing signs of the crash. His white t-shirt bloodied on the back, but thanks to her handy stitch work, it wasn’t becoming worse. 

“Is he going to die?” Regina asked as she looked down at the unconscious man before them. 

“Do you know him?” David asked incredulously. He must have assumed she was alone. 

“He was sitting next to me on the plane,” she said by way of explanation. She kept her face as blank as possible as she waited for David’s response.

David only nodded, accepting her answer, as he watched the man breathe steadily. “I think we were at about forty thousand feet when it happened. I blacked out,” David said as he picked at his fingernail between his teeth. Disgusting habit, but Regina kept that thought to herself. 

“I didn’t,” she added staring off into the fire nearest them, remembering what had transpired. “I saw the whole thing.” She shook her head and cast her eyes down at the unconscious man again. “I knew the half behind us was gone, but I couldn’t look back. If I saw that the plane was ripped in half… it would become real.” David was watching her as she spoke. “And then the front half of the plane broke off, too. If we had been sitting anywhere but the middle…”

“Well, the cockpit isn’t on the beach any more than the tail is. We need to figure out which way we came in. We find the cockpit, we find the transmitter. We can radio for help.”

“I saw smoke,” Regina offered. “If you’re going for the cockpit, I am too.”

David smiled, but it faltered as a shrieking noise rented through the somber atmosphere of the beach where all conversations simultaneously stopped. Somewhere deeper into the trees and the far off mountains, something terrible was calling out. It continued with a strange rattling noise, the shifting of metal on metal again that they were all so familiar with by now and another shriek. 

“What was that?” someone nearby asked. 

David and Regina looked at each other silently before they both stood. 

People were gathering to watch how the palm trees, illuminated only by the bonfires on the beach, began shifting heavily as if something massive was pushing past them. 

“Did anyone see that?” someone else asked. “Yeah,” answered a giant of a man.

Suddenly, a loud howling siren of a sound echoed from the valley. Was it an animal or a machine? Regina wasn’t sure. People stood and approached to either side of Regina. More crashing from the trees in multiple directions, trees fell, more howling sirens. Regina stood watching, wondering what the hell they had fallen into.

Others watched in mixed expressions of horror and confusion, but Regina spared them none of her attention. “Terrific,” a British accent said sarcastically next to Regina. She glanced at him as he stood there with his hood covering half his face. 

 

**_Earlier that day_ **

**David**

He stared at the plastic cup as an ice cube shifted and melted. The yellow of pineapple juice mixed with the ice cubes was nearly gone. The constant hum of the plane’s engine drew his attention out the little window to observe the wing ahead of him. He was glad he wasn’t seated directly over a wing. It caused a much noisier flight, a seat that wouldn’t recline if he was in front of an exit row, or he’d have to agree to helping in event of aircraft emergency. All he ever did was help in times of emergency. He needed a break. But this last minute trip to Australia had been anything but a vacation. His elderly step father had died while on vacation and David had to go fetch his body. Albert had never been a good father figure, but neither had David’s biological father who had run off and died a drunk. 

“How’s the drink?” he heard the feminine voice ask. The stewardess was standing in the aisle with a pleasant smile on her face as she waited for his answer.

“Uh, fine.” 

“That wasn’t a very strong answer,” she quipped with a little smirk that told David she was flirting with him. 

He shrugged as he glanced at the nearly empty cup. “Well, it wasn’t a very strong drink.” 

Looking around themselves, the stewardess leaned over her cart and discreetly pulled two small bottles of vodka and handed them to him. “Just don’t tell anyone.”

He took the bottles, pocketed one, and poured the other over his ice. It raised the level by an inch. Good enough. He had no interest in getting drunk. Taking a long sip, the cheap alcohol burned his esophagus as he winced and stood. 

Some gangly man in eyeliner and a hooded sweatshirt pushed past him in a bigger hurry to get to the bathroom. “Excuse me! Sir!” the stewardess called running after him. 

The plane shuddered with turbulence just then causing a groan from everyone around him. 

David sat again and buckled his seatbelt. “This is normal,” he told the woman across the aisle who was gripping the armrests in fear. 

“I’ll be sure to tell my husband that when he returns from the bathroom,” she breathed as she glanced up as the ‘Fasten Seatbelt’ light came on. 

The turbulence continued, but David looked back to the woman. “I’ll keep you company until he does. Don’t worry. It’s going to be over…” He didn’t get to finish as the plane suddenly dropped in altitude, a man in the aisle flew up and struck the ceiling. Screams and gasps filled his ears as the plane shook violently. He tried to turn his head to look at the woman again. Her eyes were clenched shut as her mouth moved in silent prayer. 

The oxygen masks dropped before them and he saw her reach for it in desperation. He got his own mask over his head, but looking back at the woman, she was only clutching it to her face. She didn’t put the elastic band behind her head. He tried pointing at the band but he couldn’t speak. The shaking was too violent, the screams too loud. She would lose oxygen if the plane depressurized. Didn’t she know that? 

 

_**The next morning** _

**Regina**

David was staring out over the ocean as the waves broke in the distance. _‘Why hadn’t they come? Where were the rescue crews?’_ The same questions they had all heard over and over all morning. _‘These things take time,’_ he assured. _‘They will come. They will find us.’_ He was quite the optimist, even for a doctor, but he seemed genuine about it. He was different than other doctors who had deceived her in the past.

“You ready?” Regina asked behind David breaking his focus on the horizon as he looked behind himself to see Regina standing there waiting. 

His eyes raked down her figure and Regina just slightly pushed one shoulder back enough to add some feminine appeal to her curves and the low cut blouse she wore over the pants-suit trousers.

“You told me where you saw the smoke. I can hike up that way myself,” he said with his hands propped on his hips as his eyes continued to scan the people behind Regina.

“I told you, I’m coming with you,” she demanded, a flare of indignation lighting her eyes as he seemed to think he had the right to dismiss her.

David chuckled as he glanced down and scratched his upper lip. “Well,” he drawled. “You’re going to need some better shoes. Pumps aren’t going to work in the jungle, ma'am.”

“They're all I have!” she cried defensively, disregarding the title he so casually used, as he looked away from her again. So many bodies still lay unburied upon the shore. But they couldn’t be buried yet. The rescue would happen and these people needed to be claimed and buried near their families, he had said earlier.

Regina followed his gaze before she walked uneasily through the sand. Stepping past a few of the deceased, she would show him that Regina Mills was not one to be left behind when she set her mind to action. Eyeing the footwear she passed, some were clearly too large, some too small, and some were god-awful and not fit to be worn by anyone, not even the dead. But she stopped before a man wearing what looked like Timberlands boots and near enough to her size that they might just work. Carefully, she pulled one off as she squatted by the foot and peeled the tongue of the shoe back to observe the size. 

Never being one to give up, she nodded at seeing the size, minus one in men’s, matched her own. Pulling and tugging at the other boot, she strained until the boot slid free and was in her hands. 

Glancing up, a small-framed, gaunt-faced man with dirty, greying-brown hair was looking her way. He had a bright red cut on his face, but he looked overall well. He smiled but instead of teeth, he bared an orange concealing his teeth in a mockery of a grin. Was that meant to make her laugh? Regina scowled at him. There was nothing funny about anything going on here, especially while Regina was squatting among the dead! The man’s smile dropped and he looked down at the ground as if he were ashamed of himself. As he should be! 

David was kneeling around a circle of other misfits. A young woman of no more than twenty was insisting they were going to be rescued any moment now and there was no need to deal with the bodies, nor was she going to eat. She’d wait until the rescue boat appeared with real food and eat then. A touseled-haired, bearded young man offered her a chocolate bar. He shrugged at her prim refusal, peeled back the wrapper and took a big bite out of the bar only to earn a scoff from the woman.

“I’m going to go find the cockpit. Look for the transceiver,” David said as he stood.

“I’m going with you, mate,” one of the men said as he stood as well.

“No, I don’t need anymore help,” David interrupted with a hand out. Regina would have nodded at that. The other man looked like trouble as far as Regina could tell; bad eyeliner and poor taste in clothing. He looked like some nobody, garage-band, pirate. No, she didn’t want him tagging along.

“I don’t want to just stand around. I want to help,” the grungy pirate insisted.

To her dismay, David nodded and the three were ready to embark.

 

Higher up in a grassy field surrounded by mountains, the boots seemed to have been a perfect choice, of course. Her feet were much happier than she had been in the last twenty-four hours in her Manolo Blahniks. Shame they had to be left on the beach. Likely, they were stolen by now.

The pirate was stalking casually behind her humming something repetitive to himself, David in the lead. 

“Will you ever shut up?” Regina declared, finally unable to take another minute of his incessant rambling. 

“Aye, but why should I? Beautiful weather.” The pirate had the audacity to inhale the fresh air and smile at the sky. Sickening. 

Something about the way he smiled though rang familiar. “Have we met before?” she asked almost accusingly as he began to smirk at her. 

“No, that’s not likely. Do I... look familiar to you?” He was starting to grin cheekily at her.

“Mm, yes, but I’m not sure where.”

“I think I can help.”

“Oh?” she asked as she began walking after David again in her attempt to keep up. She would not be left behind. 

And then the pirate began singing lyrics to go along with that incessant hum he’d been repeating for the last hour. “Sound familiar?” he asked, still grinning. 

“Yeah? What’s that? Sounds like something my college roommate listened to.” She wouldn’t admit she and her roommate had similar taste in music and men back then. It didn’t matter now.

“The Villains!” he declared with his arms spread wide.

"The…” Regina paused when she realized that was a band name, and coincidentally, one her roommate had favored. “Oh. Right.” She shook her head wondering why that was supposed to be so marvelous or why he was such a super fan himself.

He must have realized she didn’t understand, so he pointed at his chest. “That’s me! I played bass! Track three.” And he belted out the line again singing proudly. 

“No way. That’s not you!” She frowned at him trying to find some semblance of familiarity in his face. Aside from the eyeliner and the way he dressed, she really wasn’t sure. 

“Aye, it’s me! Killian Jones of The Villains!” He looked so damned pleased with himself, Regina couldn’t hold back the smile as she shook her head and kept walking. 

“My roommate would die. She loved you,” she admitted trying not to show too much of her grin. 

“Oh, aye? Me specifically?” He puffed out his chest as if she’d paid him the greatest compliment.

Regina nodded as she kept her eyes ahead on the back of David as he continued to hike up the hill. She remembered Killian Jones, alright. The other band members didn’t go so heavy on the eye liner, but it worked for this guy and strangely enough, it gave him a little more sex-appeal. Regina might have agreed with her roommate, even had a one night stand with a guy that looked vaguely like Jones, but she bit her lip to keep it to herself. Those days were long gone and would not be repeated aloud to this big-headed, egotistical pirate. Regina had been too reckless in college just for the sake of defying her controlling mother.

David approached to see what was keeping them. “Have you heard of The Villains?” Regina asked him to take the focus off of herself. The pirate chanted the line again trying to help David recognize him.

David was sweating profusely from the hike and shook his head as he gestured farther uphill. “Gotta keep moving.” Thankfully, it seemed David had some class about him. 

 

A few minutes later, it began to rain. 

“Hey!” Killian yelled over the noise. “Is this normal? Day becoming night, end-of-the-world-type stuff?”

 

**Emma**

On the beach, as the rain poured down, people began to scramble to get under life rafts, scraps of metal, or anything they could seek shelter under. Emma was gently shoved under a life raft with a man and a young boy of about ten. She watched as a man was turned away from a lean-to as two women huddled underneath. Emma couldn’t hear what was being said, but it was clear from her body language and screaming that that space was claimed and no one else was welcomed. The shorter, blonde woman next to her huddled under her sweater held overhead as the taller blonde glared at the retreating man. The flash of gold on their wrists showed through the darkening sky. Gold watches meant money. Emma bit her lip at the sight of them and frowned. 

Her eyes scanned the beach as people continued to run for cover. But there was one man just… sitting in the sand. He was thin and small framed, his hair in limp curls hanging from his head, but as he turned his face up towards the sky and the rain pelted off his body, his mouth broke into a grin of pure bliss. His hands spread wide, palms turned up upwards, and Emma’s mouth opened in amazement. 

"Papa," the boy behind Emma whispered in admonishment behind her, and Emma noticed the boy was smiling at the man in the rain.

Just then, the cracking and shrieking from the trees sounded off again just like the night before. “There it is again,” Emma said as she watched the treeline trying to see what made the noise. 

The woman that had needed CPR the day before approached her side. “Oh my God,” she whispered.

**David**

Past the stalks of tall grass and thoroughly drenched, the trio approached the structure looming before them. “There it is,” David said with foreboding in his voice. The front of the plane was propped against taller palm trees at a forty five degree angle. Jagged edges against the gaping maw of the interior showed how it had been ripped away from the middle of the plane. The inside was a wreckage of oxygen masks and dead bodies. 

The three of them climbed up into the plane, the steep angle requiring them to grab the armrests to go further. Their slick bottomed shoes made the climb difficult, but the humidity made the smell worse. He was sure he heard Regina gag. 

Killian was the farthest back and made a noise of, “Agh,” as he grabbed a leg for support and flung his hand away in disgust when he realized he had grabbed the leg of the deceased. 

David couldn’t spare the other man a second. He was nearly at the top by then where the pilot’s door was. It was locked, of course, so he grabbed a small fire extinguisher beside the door and wrenched it out of its holder. 

_Bang! Bang! Bang!_ Three hits to the locking mechanism did nothing. 

Regina was slowly approaching behind him as she clutched at the coffee cubby to watch. Three more strikes and the door suddenly flew back at David. Regina screamed as a body of a pilot flew out of the cockpit and down past the rows of seats. Killian was watching in horror as the body struck a wall next to him. 

Clenching his eyes shut as his heart raced, David took a few breaths before he asked Regina who was closest to him, “You okay?”

“Yeah,” she exclaimed through rapid breaths.

“I’m fine!” Killian called from farther below. “Killian’s fine by the way! Thank you for asking!” He continued his upward climb by pulling on the armrests until he finally joined them. 

The door to the cockpit was hanging open. Regina was still working her way carefully closer to the door when David noticed. “You don’t have to come up here,” he warned her. 

“I’m good,” she insisted, so he reached out for her hand to help her in. “So what does the transceiver look like?”

“Complicated walkie-talkie,” David told her as he positioned himself better on the steep incline. 

Regina was half climbing over the remaining pilot when suddenly the man took a gasping breath and choked as if he’d just come back to life. She hurled herself away from the choking man as David leaned in closer to get a better look at him. One eye was swollen shut and blood ran down a cut in his eyebrow. 

“How many survivors?” the pilot wheezed after David put some water in his mouth and checked his good eye. 

“At least forty eight,” David supplied as he continued to check the man. “Anything broken?”

The pilot carefully shook his head. “My head’s just… dizzy.”

“Probably a concussion.”

“How many hours? Any rescue?” The pilot was having trouble catching his breath and he couldn’t keep the water down. 

“Sixteen hours. No one’s come yet.” David explained as his fingers continued busily upon the pilot’s person, checking him for further injury.

“Six hours in, my radio went out. No one could see us. We turned back to land in Fiji, but when we hit turbulence, we were already a thousand miles off course. They’re… they’re looking for us in the wrong place.” The pilot’s words settled heavily with dread while the rain pattered down hard on the windshield. 

“Do you have a transceiver?” David asked. He followed the pilot’s gesture and pulled a headset and radio out and into the man’s hands. “Where’s Killian?” David asked Regina once he realized the other man hadn’t joined them in the cockpit. Regina only shook her head before turning away and into the fuselage to look for him. 

“Killian?” she called. A door just beyond the cockpit flew open to reveal Killian bursting out and holding on to the frame so he wouldn’t fall.

“Why were you in the bathroom?” she asked him pointedly. 

Killian gave her a look of shock before his expression shifted to a smirk. “Well,” he drawled as he raised an eyebrow at Regina. “I wouldn’t say no to the mile high club with you, love, but we’re only about twenty feet up.”

Regina had no time to smack him for the innuendo, when a howling siren rented the air over the sound of the pounding rain and the plane shook again. 

“Regina!” David called and he reached for her. She took his hand and let him help her back up into the cockpit. Killian braced himself within the doorway of the bathroom. 

“It’s right outside,” she whispered as the sound of creaking trees told them where it was. Whatever the hell it was.

“What’s outside?” the pilot asked wholly confused.

Regina tucked herself behind the pilot’s seat as she braced herself there to be able to see the dirty windshield and how the foliage brushed against it. David climbed down enough to be able to see through another window as he wiped at the fogged glass. They couldn’t see past it at all. The pilot stood from his seat and set the radio down as he reached for something. 

All was quiet for a moment as Killian entered the cockpit. 

The glass beside the pilot shattered with an ear-splitting crash, Regina and Killian were screaming, and the pilot was lifted bodily out of the windshield as the siren howled again. Blood splattered the remaining windshield as rain pelted in through the hole. The pilot was gone. 

“What the bloody hell just happened?” Killian yelled. 

The plane was struck so hard it shifted from its forty five degree angle and slid backwards on its perch. David lunged for the radio but it flew just out of his reach. The plane slammed onto level ground and Killian’s body hit a seat. 

“David! Come on!” Regina yelled. David’s fingers tightened around the radio, and they were off running. Out in the rain, the droplets struck his skin like rocks. Regina was ahead of him this time, Killian at his side, but they ran. The creature, whatever it was, continued to roar behind them. The deafening crack of trees, lighting striking flashed the sky, thunder and more roaring filled the air. 

And then suddenly, Killian was no longer beside him. “Help!” Killian yelled. Regina kept running. David skidded to stop in the flowing mud under his shoes. Killian’s foot was caught in a root. He pulled at the man’s leg as they both scrambled, but the mud was flowing too quickly, and the noise of a large beast was growing louder. 

The ground was shaking as if heavy bodied dinosaurs were stomping ever nearer. He heard the scream of his name, “David!” from a distance, but he couldn’t get Killian’s leg free.

**Regina**

She’d never been so terrified in her entire life: freezing, soaked to the bone, and completely unaware of what the hell was chasing her! A cage of tightly grown bamboo shoots was just ahead. She nearly slipped, but the blessed boots kept her footing until she reached the bamboo. She fell then, her knee coming into contact with a rock, but she barely felt it as she scrambled up and grabbed the nearest bamboo. 

The roar sounded again. Everything she knew told her dinosaurs and monsters didn’t exist. So why did she suddenly believe some kind of monster was chasing them. Something ate the pilot! She saw with her own eyes. It was real!

Shaking violently, Regina clutched her arms around herself, her jaw clattered against her teeth as she looked for any sign of movement. Where were they? They were just behind her! Now she was alone? She wanted to cry out to call for them, but what if the monster heard? She didn’t want to die terrified. Trying again, a small sound of fear erupted from her lips. She hated sounding weak and afraid more than anything, but she had to know. “David!” she screamed. 

A noise from behind her caused her to whirl around and press her back into the bamboo. It was the monster, wasn’t it? She should run. Turning in the other direction, she set one foot out to run, but crashed bodily into a hooded Killian. He slipped and fell backwards into the mud and Regina fell on top of him. “Damn it! Where the hell is David?” she screamed.

“I-- I dunno!” he said. His lips looked blue and he was shaking just as badly as Regina. “He pulled me up.”

“How can you not know?” Her fists were clenching his trashy sweatshirt as she slammed her fists into his chest.

“I dunno!” he repeated. “I fell down. He came back for me. That thing was right there. We were dead, but David came back and he pulled me up. I don’t know where he is.”

Suddenly the rain stopped. Regina looked up from Killian to their surroundings. “We have to go back for him,” Regina decided.

“But… but there’s a certain gargantuan quality about this thing,” Killian tried as he sat up. 

“Then stay here and cower.” Regina stood and stalked back the way she had come, no longer afraid. 

Killian followed behind her. “I heard you shout David. I’m Killian, by the way.” She’d heard him the first two or three times he’d said his name, but his name didn’t matter. What did matter was the shining silver object ahead in the mud. She stopped as she realized what it was. Pilot’s wings. 

“Bloody hell,” Killian muttered just over her shoulder. She turned to see that he was looking up. Following his gaze, she saw the body of the pilot overhead in the trees. The body had been savaged and torn to pieces. “How does something like that happen?” he asked, just as mystified as she.

Just then, David emerged from the trees. “Did you see it?” Regina asked. She wouldn’t bring herself to call it a monster. Admitting belief would be too far.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: There is some cultural insensitivity in this chapter (and this will be the only chapter with that happening). This story takes place in 2004, three years after 9/11. The mindset of certain characters is still very much stuck in that time frame and there is a specific reason for that which hasn't been divulged to the reader yet. A plane has crashed for suspicious reasons and people are traumatized and reactive. Accusation are thrown as they are often in real life. I do not condone this behavior at all. I tried any way I could to avoid this situation but it resulted in writing that was not in the direction I wanted this story to go, so I took care in writing this as delicately as I could while preserving the outline and goal of the story. This AU is a crossover with Lost and this situation did occur on the show. I've promised a dark fic here with few happy endings, so unfortunately, cultural insensitivity is part of it as it is in the real world.  
> -AA

[](https://ibb.co/dYPyrK)

**Killian**

“What were you doing in the bathroom?” Regina asked Killian as they walked at a leisurely pace through the jungle.

“I was puking my guts up. The corpses... I thought it was obvious.” He cast a glance at her to notice how she was scrutinizing him. “My one contribution to the trek.” His voice trailed off. “I’m a coward.”

Regina scoffed and paused a moment as she weighed his explanation. “You are not a coward. I’m glad you came. Killian.”

“No, I am,” Killian said glancing back to Regina with a nod at her use of his name, and smiled slightly. “I hate flying. I wanted to sail from Australia, but my mates… the band…” He paused again remembering that they were dead now, and gulped as he looked down at his boots as he stepped over a fallen tree limb. “They said, ‘Killian, that’s a bloody long way to sail. We’ll take the plane and go to Disneyland after.’” He shrugged as if that was all to the story.

“Well, it seems you were right,” Regina offered. And apparently she bought the lie, Killian saw, as she smiled encouragingly. “And… I can’t say I didn’t feel queasy in the plane, too.”

He raised an eyebrow at her as if weighing the truth of her own statement. She looked completely put together even if her hair was damp from the freak rainstorm and sweat beaded on her face and neckline. He, on the other hand, knew his hair was hanging down in his eyes, and his eye liner likely was worse off than her own, but he’d use the dishevelment to aid in his deception. His fingers in his pocket ran over the dime-sized packet noting it was still there after fleeing for their lives.

“Any idea what that thing was?” he asked, changing the subject.

Regina visibly shivered and ran her hands over her sleeves as the soaked material clung to her arms. “No.” She was lying, he guessed. She had an idea but didn’t want to say.

“D’ye need…?” he grabbed the front of his hoodie to suggest he’d let her wear it for warmth even if it was just as soaked through, but Regina’s face contorted to a look of horror only for a moment before she gained control over herself and her manners and shook her head. “No. Thank you.”

Killian shrugged and looked ahead at David who was still in the lead. “Oi, mate! Is that thing working?”

David glanced over his shoulder towards he and Regina but didn’t stop his progress. “The answer is still no just like the last time.”

**_Flashback to Oceanic 815_ **

_TapTapTapTap. TapTapTap._ Killian squeezed his eyes shut as he tapped his thumb ring on the metal arm rest, his back arching in the seat. His nerves were shot. He needed a hit. _TapTap._

“Sir? Are you alright?” The stewardess was looking at him with concern in her eyes.

“No, I’m alright. Thank you,” Killian said tightly. Was that accusation in her eyes? Suspicion? She kept staring at him. He stared back wishing she would just bugger off. He added a smile.

Finally, she took the hint. “Okay.” And straightened her back and stepped away from him.

He noticed his heart was racing and sweat was beading on his brow. _TapTapTapTap._

There was a noise behind himself, so he looked to see the stewardess talking to two other official looking people. They were all looking at him. All with suspicious glares. She began to make her way towards him again. That was it. He had to go now!

Flipping the safety buckle, he was jumping out of his seat before the belt dropped and jogged toward the front of the plane to the lavatories ahead, zig-zagging between rows and around concierge carts to lose them as they pursued. He stepped on a couple’s feet and a curse was yelled after him. Some guy in a suit nearly blocked his progress by standing as well and Killian shoved past him with a mumbled, “‘Scuse me.” The lavatory had been cleared and he scooted into the narrow closet just as a, “Sir!” called out from behind him.

As soon as he was in with the door latched, the plane shook with turbulence, but Killian barely noticed. He had his boot off and was digging the small baggie out and into his shaking hand. Almost. Almost.

A knocking on the door, and a man’s voice called out. “Sir? I’m going to have to ask you to step out.” The plane was slightly shaking with turbulence, but Killian was running his powdered finger along his gums in desperation. An instant sense of ease and relief filled him as he touched the mirror, sated and relieved. “Sir? Open the door now!” The voice without called.

He couldn’t get caught with this in his possession, so he held the nearly full bag over the empty toilet bowl and dropped it in. As he was reaching for the flush handle, the plane suddenly dropped in elevation and Killian’s body flew to strike the ceiling before falling back down onto the toilet lid, slamming it shut.

Screaming outside the door reached his ears. “Bloody hell,” he breathed as he reached for the door to run back out into the fuselage. He had to find a seat and buckle up or his high wasn’t going to last very long.

He fell as the plane’s nose dove down and had to lunge out of the way as a concierge cart came barreling towards him. It struck the wall where he had been with a loud bang. He yelled as other objects flew at him. The plane was screaming as were the people. Oxygen masks had already dropped and Killian was laying on the floor. He crawled and clawed his way to an empty seat as he gasped, eyes wide, and scared as hell. Once he managed to get the safety buckle latched, he grabbed the oxygen mask and threw the elastic band behind his head. 

**Alice**

Robyn had rolled her capri pant legs up to her knees as she crouched in the roiling surf between the rocks. Her eyes were so focused on looking through the water, that she hadn’t heard Alice when she complained about the heat.

The cardigan sweater was much too warm for wearing on the beach, so Alice slipped the top three buttons loose to give her neck some air. The rock she was perched upon was more like a boulder. It kept her out of the water, but close enough to Robyn that they could talk to each other if Robyn wasn’t so distracted. Alice slumped down upon an elbow, bored.

“Ah ha!” Robyn cheered suddenly as she jerked forward, grabbing something beneath the water.

Alice leaned over the rock to see what her love had caught when Robyn stood upright with a crab in hand as it wiggled its legs in the air at the sudden assault of being taken from the water. “Eww!” Alice yelled at the sight, grinning broadly at how victorious Robyn looked with her prey in hand. “It looks like a spider!”

“It may look like a spider, but crab is freakin’ delicious. Haven’t you ever had it?”

Alice shook her head and giggled as Robyn shifted her arm to bring it closer. “No, no! I can see it fine from here!” she said as she shifted onto her knees to back away on the boulder.

“Excuse me!” a male voice called from behind Alice.

Alice shrieked as she whirled around to see the man that had approached. With all the noise from the waves crashing and being so distracted by Robyn and the crab, she hadn’t heard the man’s approach until he was just there.

“I’m… I’m sorry for startling you, miss. Misses,” he added upon noticing Robyn on the opposite side of the boulder. “But, I… I cannae find my son. Again.” He was twiddling his fingers and his eyes were the saddest she had ever seen. He broke her heart. “He’s ten, wavy brown hair, brilliant smile? Have...have you seen him?”

Alice shook her head, but quickly slid off the boulder to land sure-footed in the sand beside the man. “No, I haven’t seen any boys like that. Have you, Robyn?” she asked as she turned to look her way.

But Alice blanched at the expression on Robyn’s face. She was glaring at Alice and pointed at her own neck with a sharp gesture. Alice looked down to realize her cardigan was unbuttoned a little too far to reveal cleavage and her undershirt. Her cheeks pinkened as her fingers quickly buttoned it up to her throat.

“No,” Robyn called out to the man. “We haven’t seen any boys.” The glare she shot at him made it clear she didn’t appreciate his closeness to Alice either.

The man’s eyes only then seemed to notice Alice buttoning up her sweater despite the warmth of the day and he took a step away from her. “I’m… I’m sorry to bother you. If you…”

“Yes. Okay. Bye!” Robyn stomped around the boulder to stand next to Alice with the wriggling crab still in hand.

The man jerked back at the sight and blinked at it before turning and hurrying away.

**Gold**

He was near in panic after leaving the two young women. Enough sand had fallen into his shoes and socks that he could feel the grit between his toes further adding to his discomfort. But where Neal had gone, Gold hadn’t a clue. It wasn’t exactly that he was concerned about danger from the other passengers; the lad was ten and well capable of taking care of himself to an extent. It was that roaring creature in the distant valley and trees that worried him along with snakes and scorpions, poisonous frogs, and whatever else lurked in the jungle. Perhaps there was even quicksand! He didn’t know, but his son was out there somewhere and the not-knowing was killing Gold.

He’d told Neal to stay on the beach, to stay within his sight. Gold didn’t want to be one of those overbearing fathers that ended up turning his only son against him out of pre-teen rebellion. It would have been nice to be seen as a pal or a confidant of a father. Anything that would lift him up higher in his son’s eyes despite what his mother, Gold’s ex-wife Milah - rest her wretched soul - may have told their son.

“Neal!” he called out, but the wind was to his face and he doubted his voice carried very far. Cupping his hands around his mouth, he tried again. “Neal!”

Still, he trod along the beach, the crashing surf to his left and the trees to his right. It was nice to be able to walk in sand, he reflected. This never would have been possible with the chair, and would have been difficult with the cane. He could feel the burn of exercise in his thighs as he walked. It had been too many years since he’d walked this far and this quickly with an easy gait.

“Neal! Where are you?” he half-moaned.

A shuffling of the foliage to his right brought him to an instant stop. His fingers fiddled with each other in front of him as he looked towards the movement. “Neal?” he asked in a hushed tone. _Oh gods! Is it the beast?_ Jerking his head back towards the beach, there was no one else in sight. No one to cry out to for help. Even the two women were so far back from him, they would never know if it reached out and devoured him on the spot. He was alone and would die alone! A whimper escaped his throat as he took two hasty steps backwards as the crashing became louder. Only for a black, furry beast of a dog to leap out at him, tail wagging furiously.

“Rumples!” Gold heard the juvenile voice call out farther into the trees. “Come here, boy!” The dog turned his head back towards the approaching boy, then looked up at Gold and sniffed at his legs.

“Oh, it’s you,” he said with relief to his service dog as he scratched the black lab’s head. “Where have you been?” The boy came following along behind just a moment later with a leash in one hand and something metallic swinging from the other. “Neal!” Gold admonished in a louder voice. “I told you not to leave the beach! After everything that’s happened, there are dangerous… things in there.” He cast a suspicious look beyond Neal before recalling how Milah would react to his losing the boy and then promptly chiding him, and held up an arm for the Neal to approach. “What’s that you’ve got?” he asked nodding toward the metallic object.

Neal lifted the shiny pair of handcuffs with a peculiar expression on his face. “I found these just over there. Rumples was sniffing them. He was lost, too, but now he’s back.” Instead of embracing Gold, he squatted and threw his arms around his father’s service dog, but it was clear enough the boy had taken to the working dog as a pet.

“Handcuffs,” Gold mumbled as he took them. He cast another wary glance around the trees wondering what sort of criminal had escaped from them and who exactly it could be. “Stay by me, son. No wandering.”

**Emma**

There wasn’t much to do on the beach for an eight month pregnant woman with bloated feet, Emma reflected as she watched the sand fall between her toes. She dug her foot beneath the sand again and watched the same thing happen again.

People were doing things, productive things, maybe. They seemed to think it was going to take longer than it already had for rescue crews to come.

“Hey,” a male voice called out. Emma turned to look but saw the British guy that had tried and failed to give CPR the day before, and he was talking to a young, brunette woman who lay out on the beach in a string bikini tanning herself. Her figure was one to envy.

“We’re forming up into crews. Going through suitcases for clothes and supplies. Want to help?” he asked her.

“Why?” the woman said without opening her eyes. She tilted her chin up further. “We’re going to be rescued soon. You’re wasting your time.”

The man looked at her for another few seconds and shook his head before turning and leaving her to her sunshine.

“I remember when I had a figure,” Emma said wistfully. She pulled her outer layer plaid shirt off and threw it to her side in the sand.

The other woman cast a quick glance at her. Her eyes trailed down to Emma’s belly, understanding, before she rolled over onto her own trim stomach to tan her back.

“Is that your boyfriend?” Emma asked.

The other woman made a disgusted sound. “No. He’s my brother, Graham. _Step_ brother. God’s gift to humanity. Eagle scout, aspiring law enforcement.” She rolled her eyes and propped herself up on her elbows as her eyes went back to Emma’s belly. “Know what it is?”

Emma nodded. “It’s a boy.” She looked down at it too thinking how much her life could have been different now if she hadn’t thought she had fallen in love. But she had proved to be an idiot, so there was that. “The… baby hasn’t moved since about an hour after we crashed yesterday…”

After a brief pause, the other woman said, “I’m Cora.”

**Jefferson**

His eyes scanned the pages of the book slowly as he lay reclined within his beach shelter, one arm propping his head up against the curve of what had been the fuselage. One ankle was crossed over the other and he had sufficient shade from the late morning sun.

Others still scrambled about on the beach in search of their loved ones, he assumed. Jefferson did not move from his makeshift shelter. He had no one on the island. His only someone was back in America where he’d left her before he took that stupid, goddamned job which landed him on the island.

Jefferson was not one of the crowd that had been weeping on the beach the day before. Though he did not accept his fate of being forever stuck on the island, he’d had more than sufficient alone time to think. When the plane crashed down, he had panicked then. Oh yes, he had panicked. He had run as quickly as he could through the trees until he reached the beach to see so many people strewn about, dead, dying, and crying. But he’d only looked at them in wonder. So many people. Lost. Stuck here, too, like him.

He took a long breath through his nose to keep his heart rate calm. No. They would be found. Soon. When planes crash, they are found. He’d be sure he’d be amongst them. He wouldn’t go back into the woods to be isolated, no. He’d get back to Grace very soon. He’d do anything to get back to her. Forget his job. The only thing that mattered was Grace.

Reaching out a finger, he turned the page.

_"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!_  
_The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!_  
_Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun_  
_The frumious Bandersnatch!"_

His eyes traced over the lines again trying to understand what the hell a JubJub bird might look like or what ‘frumious’ meant. Why the hell was he reading this? It was a classic, but… it was baffling. Better literature than the same-old-same-old he’d been stuck reading for the past three years one month and five days.

“Hey,” the voice interrupted as a shadow cast over the already shaded sunlight he had. Jefferson looked up to see the half-shaven, scruffy, pirate-looking guy he’d noticed earlier peering down at him.

“Yeah?” Jefferson asked as he pushed the borrowed - or found, whatever - reading glasses down his nose. “What d’you want?” He wasn’t exactly curious, but it would be easier to satisfy the interloper’s request than to completely ignore him. The guy would never go away and leave him alone if he was ignored. But then again, Jefferson mused, if he wanted to be alone, he would never have gone to the beach. He checked his wristwatch briefly before looking up again.

“You’ve got a lotta suitcases there. All of them are yours?” There was doubt in the pirate’s voice. He knew better.

Jefferson grinned as he shifted his body to be able to sit. His thumb remained in the book as he closed it over the digit and sat looking up at the man. “They are now,” he drawled. “Looking for something?”

The pirate tilted his head to get a better look at the book in Jefferson’s lap. _“Through the Looking Glass,_ eh?”

Jefferson raised his eyebrows.

“Those glasses don’t look like yours, mate. Unless hot pink is your style? I’m not judging…” He shrugged as he looked at Jefferson dubiously.

“You and your eyeliner want to know?” Jefferson asked with a smirk to which the pirate only grinned to reveal perfectly straight, white teeth. Jefferson continued, “Possession is nine tenths of the law and all that. And besides, I think they make me look sophisticated. What’dya think?” He flashed a grin of his own white teeth which earned a half-grin back from the pirate.

“If you’re sophisticated, I’m the jolly ole King of England. Look, mate.” He squatted in front of Jefferson as if he’d been invited. “I’ve got a lass over there that’s great with child. She needs some meds. Antacids, pain killers. That sort of thing. Have you got any in your hoard of luggage?” His eyes flicked toward the suitcases surrounding Jefferson.

“Maybe.” He shrugged. “What’ll you give me for it?”

The other man raised an eyebrow, puzzled. “Well,” he drawled as he rubbed the back of his head with uncertainty. He’d likely expected Jefferson to just give it over. “I haven’t gotten anything to my name but the clothes on my back.” He had one hand in his sweatshirt pocket clearly holding something and Jefferson’s eyes followed the motion wondering what he was hiding when the man jerked his hand back out as if caught, but empty handed.

“What do you do for a living?” Jefferson asked, finally curious at this man’s attire, accent and all.

“Singer!” He perked up, proud of himself. “I play bass in The Villains. Killian Jones, you know?” He flashed another smile and belted out a line of lyrics, to which Jefferson just looked at him blankly.

“Right…” Jefferson said slowly, unimpressed. He’d never heard anything new since late 2001, but he wasn’t going to admit that oddity. His own music collection consisted of vinyls from the 70s and earlier. “Anything else?”

Killian’s expression fell as he looked away for a moment towards where this pregnant _lass_ must be, Jefferson assumed. “I’ve got some money.”

“Lotta good that’ll do us here. Tell you what. I’ll give you the meds. You help me when I need it, yeah?” Jefferson suggested, both eyebrows raised towards his hairline expectantly.

Killian grinned again as he clapped his hands together once, satisfied with the deal. “Aye, yes. That’ll be grand. Thank you, mate.”

Jefferson set _Through the Looking Glass_ off to his side as he flipped open one of the suitcases, this one a deep purple color. There was a vial of Tylenol which he dropped two pills into his palm and dropped them into Killian’s. “Antacids,” he muttered as he pushed a few items of feminine clothing out of his way to find what he was looking for. Half a roll of TUMS was produced and he dropped that into Killian’s hand as well. “She’ll need all of it probably in less than a day. Tell her to wait as long as she can between taking them. It’s all we’ve got left.”

Something changed in Killian’s face as he studied Jefferson’s. Jefferson dropped his sly grin to one of aloofness until Killian shrugged. “Thanks, mate.”

Jefferson nodded once and crossed his arms. “You guys went off to find the cockpit earlier.” It wasn’t a question.

Killian blinked at him before shrugging. “Yeah?”

“Find anything?”

Killian nodded. “Yeah. Found a radio and dead bodies. Bloody waste of time. Couldn’t get it to work.” He tapped his forehead in salute and strode through the thick sand towards where the pregnant woman had wandered off.

Jefferson sunk back into the sand leaning back on his elbows with a wistful sigh. _’Couldn’t get it to work.’_ Those words echoed through his mind as he rubbed a weary hand down his face. Shaking his head to dispel any negative thoughts, he reached for the book again to continue reading about a fearsome jabberwock, a very lost girl, and her potentially imaginary madman.

Sand was kicked over his leg as a dog stepped into his space panting loudly at him. Jefferson frowned at the intrusion and looked up to see - what was his name? Gold, and his son Neal - approaching him. Setting the book down again, Jefferson brushed off his trouser leg and stood up with a grin.

“Nice to see you’re all together today.” He envied the man for having his son with him; as terrible it was that they were stuck on the island, at least they were together.

Gold chuckled as he ran his fingers through Neal’s hair playfully. Neal ducked out from under his father’s hand and only half-glared up at the older man.

Jefferson noticed the metal cuffs in Gold’s hands immediately and inclined his chin at them. “What’s that about?”

Gold winced as he moved the cuffs from one hand to the other. “You said you watch. You watch the people?”

Jefferson nodded slowly, suspiciously, wondering what he was inferring, and crossed his arms over his chest.

“My boy, Neal, he found these hidden in the treeline. D’ye think we’ve got a criminal amongst us?”

Jefferson looked briefly at the cuffs before shaking his head. “Well, it’s not like I’ve seen anyone in striped pajamas running around here. They’re probably dressed like anyone else. I’ll keep watch.”

Gold nodded his thanks to Jefferson, tucked Neal back under his arm and left. The dog followed at a jog.

Jefferson scanned the beach as promised, and squinted. Maybe it was time to step away from his solitary lifestyle and get involved. There was only so much he could learn by watching.

**David**

He’d been back on the beach no more than an hour when a sudden cacophony of shouts and the slam of fists on flesh reached his ears.

Jefferson was slamming his fists into another man who was giving back as good as he got, however.

David watched for only a moment longer when sand was being thrown towards the eyes of the other, and David couldn’t stand around another second watching like the circle of people around the brawling men.

He grabbed Jefferson behind the arms and yanked him back. “Get off!”

“Tell them! Tell them what you said to me!” Jafar yelled. “Tell them that I crashed the plane!”

“You sure did, buddy! I know it was you!” Jefferson yelled as he struggled to break free and finally did with an elbow driven into David’s wounded side. He did, however, stay where he was.

“What is going on!?” David yelled with his arms wide between the two raging men.

“My son found these... in the jungle!” a man about David’s age said, holding up a pair of handcuffs and offered them to David. A young boy was watching from behind the man.

“People around here said you were in First Class with your hands on your lap under a blanket! You were handcuffed, weren’t you?”

“No!” Jafar yelled back, shaking his head with incredulity, his fists still balled at his sides.

“You’re also the one with the technical knowledge about how planes work. Telling everyone how _you suspect_ the electrical system failed!”

“Stop this right now!” Regina yelled, her eyes flashing as she glared at the men. It seemed to be more effective as they all glanced away from each other, suddenly quelled in their testosterone high.

“We found the transceiver in the cockpit,” Regina continued. “It isn’t working. Does anyone know how to fix it?” Her eyes landed on Jafar as she asked.

Jafar sighed heavily before stepping forward. “I can.”

“Oh sure.” Jefferson rolled his eyes before gesturing towards Jafar. “Let’s trust the convict.”

“Give it a rest,” David interrupted, a warning clear in his eyes as he stepped up closer to Jefferson.

Jefferson smirked and shook his head, taking a step back and holding his hands up. “Whatever you say, Doctor. You’re the hero around here.” He turned and stalked away, heading for the his crude shelter.

David only watched after the man for a moment longer before handing the radio to Jafar, then stuffed the folded handcuffs into his back pocket. “Can you fix it?” David asked.

Jafar pried the radio open along a seam to study the inner circuit board. “Perhaps.”

A giant of a man approached with a slow gait and peered over his shoulder. “Chain smoking jackass,” he mumbled as he looked in the direction Jefferson had gone.

“Some people have a problems,” Jafar agreed in distraction as he squinted at the interior of the radio.

“Ha, we have problems.” The man beside him shifted and glanced up at the trees overhead, grinning. “Anton.” He offered his hand to shake.

Jafar smiled and reached to shake his hand. “Jafar.”

“How do you know how to do this kind of thing?” Anton asked as he lifted the radio again.

“I was an electrician in the military,” he said vaguely.

“Oh yeah?” Anton asked, brightening. “I had a buddy in the Air Force. He fought in Iraq. What are you? Army? Marine?”

Through his long curls, he cast a quick glance at Anton. “Republican Guard,” he said, his accent noticeable even to his own ears and waited for it.

The look of understanding crossed Anton’s face as his mouth opened slightly.

Jafar only smiled and returned his focus to the radio. 

David felt a tap on his shoulder and turned from watching Jafar to see his seatmate from the plane who had needed CPR. “Doctor?” she asked with a wince.

“David,” he supplied. “What is it?”

“Aurora,” she replied in return, but her teeth worried in her lip as she pointed towards the treeline. “That man that has been unconscious? I… I think he needs help.”

**Gold**

Neal had been playing happily with Rumples along the beach, throwing sticks for the dog, and Gold shook his head as he squinted against the bright sky. He sat with a board of backgammon in front of him as Neal approached and sat before his father, winded and beaming with smiles. 

“What’s that game, Papa?”

“It’s called backgammon. It’s quite old. One of the oldest games there is.” He held up the plastic cube. “The dice were made of bone, not plastic, back then. Two sides. One is light,” he held up an off-white chip. “One is dark,” and held up a jet black chip as Neal took watched curiously. 

The fact that his son was sitting before him, interested and listening to him made Gold’s heart soar. “Want to play the game?” he asked.

**Regina**

“Any luck?” Regina asked Jafar, hope in her eyes as he pushed the front and back panels back together with a click.

Shaking his head, he held up the screen. “The radio should be getting reception.” Pointing at the digital display showed a lack of anything but the frequency number.

“And? That would mean bars like on a cell phone?” she urged.

“There’s nothing out there sending out a signal. No ships. There is no tower anywhere nearby. The radio is picking up nothing. I could leave it on and hope, but that would waste the battery.”

Her shoulders lowered only slightly in defeat. 

“There is one thing we could try. If we were on higher ground, we may be able to pick something up.” He looked towards the mountain peak behind her. And up and up higher. Jagged terrain, trees. It would be a difficult climb.”

 

“How is he?” Regina’s voice called behind David as she approached. The unconscious man before David was still just that. Unconscious and with a large piece of shrapnel jutting out just below his rib.

“I’m going to take it out,” David said frowning at the amount of blood surrounding it.

“But you said if you take it out, he’ll die,” she argued, trying to understand.

David nodded. “I thought he would be in a hospital by now. The shrapnel has kept him from bleeding to death, but if I leave it in, he’ll die of infection. And he’s still unconscious which means he could have swelling of the brain as well. If I can control the bleeding and get some antibiotics, he might survive.”

Regina pursed her lips as she stared at the man. Nothing about this sounded good. It would have been easier for everyone if he would have just died in the crash. Or overnight. Why was he still breathing?

“I’m going to hike up the mountain,” Regina said as her eyes flicked up to David’s. He shook his head, not understanding, but she continued. “Jafar fixed the transceiver, but it has to be on higher grounds or it won’t catch a signal.”

David shook his head again, more insistent this time. “You can’t. That thing is out there. You saw what it can do.”

“I’m going and you’re not going to stand in my way. I just… I thought you should know.” She raised her chin. “The battery won’t last much longer anyway.”

He was the one that had told her the day before that she wasn’t a runner. It made her feel braver than she had just after crashing. She’d already been terrified by that creature in the jungle and she wasn’t about to let it stop her now. 

David seemed to recognize the decision in her eyes as he nodded. “If you see anything, hear anything… run.”

 

Regina and Jafar were preparing to leave when Killian stumbled up to them right on the heels of the woman that had been sunbathing earlier. Apparently she had two young men after her in hot pursuit. “I’m going with you,” the young woman demanded to Regina and Jafar.

“No, you’re not, Cora! She’s not a hiker,” the second man explained, shaking his head at Regina. 

“Are you going?” Cora asked Killian, completely ignoring the one glaring at her.

Killian seemed to have a rather dopey grin on his face in contrast, yet his eyebrows rose as he eyed her figure and scratched behind his ear. “Aye, I’m going.”

“Then I’m going, too!” she declared looking between Regina and Jafar as if daring them to disagree.

Jafar stood there, chin in palm watching in amusement, but left it to them to decide. 

“Fine,” Regina snapped. “Follow along if you want. I don’t care. Just don’t let your bickering get in my way.” She turned and strode off towards the trees, a grinning Jafar following along with the rest of the entourage.

**Jefferson**

Sitting within his own shelter of warped metal, Jefferson’s eyes trailed along the words scrawled on the folded, lined paper. The purple gel ink writing hadn’t faded over the years, but the creases in the paper had worn thin with holes in some places. Still the writing was still legible. 

He read the words through emotion-reddened eyes though he could have recited the words without the letter, he’d read them so many times. With the cigarette between his fingers, he raised it to his lips as he read.

A motion to his right caught his attention and he looked to see the party of five walking into the treeline. He watched them until they disappeared from sight and dipped his head. His wrist watch beeped once. There was no need to look at the time; he knew what time it was. With practiced movements, he carefully folded the precious letter back into a small rectangle and tucked it into his pocket. 

Sighing, he took another long drag of the cigarette before cutting off the lit end to preserve what was left and then tucked that into the metal mint tin he’d found. He stood and followed behind, wiping his sleeve against one eye. He had somewhere to be and he couldn’t be late.

 

Half an hour later, Jefferson approached the party from behind at a brisk pace.

“You decided to join us,” the queen bee remarked with some acerbity in her tone.

“I’m just full of surprises, Your Majesty,” he answered back as he passed her to walk in the lead.

They climbed by grabbing tree roots, one helping the other by grabbing a hand, standing on shoulders, but not a word was spoken between them for some time. 

Once they were on level ground again and walking through tall stalks of grass, Jefferson spoke up again. “Try the radio again. We’re higher in elevation from here.”

Jafar shook his head. “Not yet. I won’t waste the batteries.”

Cora leaned in closer to Jafar to try a look, but where Jafar was holding it wasn’t close enough so she reached to snatch it from him. Jafar grabbed her wrist causing her to yelp. 

“Hey!” Jefferson yelled as Graham yanked Cora’s wrist from Jafar’s grip followed by Regina’s, “Enough!”

A sudden piercing roar silenced them. The tall grasses were moving fast as the beast approached.

“It’s coming towards us,” Killian warned, his eyes widening.

Cora shrieked and Graham pulled her to run. 

Jefferson stood his ground with a knowing look on his face as it approached. He pulled the pistol from his waistband and aimed as it came into view. A white bear? He pulled the trigger, again and again as it roared in pain while charging. He was coming towards the end of the magazine’s capacity, he knew, but he kept firing. At the last bullet, Jefferson flinched thinking he was about to be plowed down, when the bear fell, dead. Jefferson was sweating, blinking at the sight of it. It didn’t belong here. Polar bears belong in the Arctic, not the jungle. _What kind of test subject…,_ he thought before Cora spoke up behind him.

“A… a bear?” she asked with a shaky voice.

“Maybe that’s what killed the pilot,” Graham suggested.

Killian shook his head. “No, mate. This is tiny in comparison.” He brought his hands close together to demonstrate just how tiny he thought the polar bear.

“How the hell did you get a gun on a plane?” Regina asked with accusation in her voice as she looked from the pistol in his hand up to his eyes.

The others were looking at him, too, waiting. “I got it off one of the bodies.”

“One of the bodies?” Jafar deadpanned.

“People can’t take guns on planes,” Cora pointed out.

“They do if they’re a US Marshall, _Sweetheart,”_ he chided back with a grin. 

Regina shook her head. “How did you know there was one on the plane?”

“Saw an ankle holster on a body and I took it. Thought it might come in handy, and guess what? I just saved us all from a bear!”

“But how did you know he was a US Marshall?” Regina persisted.

“Didn’t say it was a he, now did I, Your Majesty?” Jefferson said pointedly. 

“You’re the prisoner,” Jafar said glaring at Jefferson. 

Jefferson shook his head as he dug in his trouser pocket to retrieve a badge proving his story, but it didn’t seem to matter now. 

Regina shifted on her feet looking uncomfortable as she gripped her arms.

“The US Marshall was bringing you back to the States,” Jafar said pointing a finger at Jefferson. “Perhaps it was you who crashed the plane!”

“If you only knew,” Jefferson grinned, shaking his head on a laugh. “I’m just as suspicious of you as you are of me.” Jafar kept up his accusations, so Jefferson rolled his head on his neck before groaning. “Fine. I’ll be the criminal. You’re the terrorist. She’s the queen. He’s the pirate. She’s the sweetheart. Who would you like to be?” he asked Graham.

The gun was suddenly yanked from Jefferson’s hand as the queen held it up and pointed it at his face. 

“Don’t shoot!” Jafar commanded, but Regina shook her head asking, “How do I dismantle this?”

Jafar told her, carefully, how to do so. Jefferson narrowed his eyes at the other man, still suspicious of him. The magazine slipped from the bottom and hit the ground. Next, per instruction, she pulled the top back and a bullet fell out of the chamber. She took the magazine and handed it to Jafar and the empty pistol to Jefferson. 

Jefferson reached out but grabbed her wrist and drew her close so that he could speak just inches from her face. “I know your type. I’ve known women like you.”

Regina looked up through her lashes at him, not even concealing a dark grin of her own. “You have no idea what I’m capable of,” she whispered, and jerked her arm from his grip. With a warning look at him, she backed away and continued on the route. 

_**Flashback to Oceanic 815** _

“Care for more, Miss?” the stewardess asked Regina.

Looking up at the uniformed woman, Regina shook her head and lowered her eyes. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

“And you, Sir?” the stewardess asked the US Marshall beside her. 

“Coffee. Black, Darlin’,” he drawled with a Texas accent. 

He was given a contemptuous look in return, but the stewardess walked off after a curt, “Sure.”

“Why don’t you want anything else to drink? Full already?” her seatmate asked with a nasty grin on his face. When Regina declined an answer, he sighed, getting more comfortable in his seat when she couldn’t. “Long flight, though. Too much to drink might make this whole situation a lot less comfortable.” He gestured at the handcuffs and the cord connecting her wrists to the bar beneath her seat. 

She rolled her eyes at him and glared out the window. 

Suddenly, a violent shudder ran through the plane. People gasped, but a moment later, the oxygen masks dropped and something struck the Marshall’s forehead and his head slumped forward. 

Regina reached for her mask, but with the hindrance of the cord, she couldn’t raise her arms any higher. She jerked and pulled, but it wouldn’t give. Instead, she turned to the Marshall. She knew where he stored the keys, she saw him tuck them away, and managed to get them in hand. Fumbling through the turbulence, she got her wrists freed and grabbed the mask. She yanked it over her face and the elastic band over her head, and considered for a moment to let the Marshall die. He was a dick after all. Regardless, she put his mask on him just before the fuselage behind her ripped in half like a child’s toy.

**David**

He’d gotten the shrapnel out and was busy stopping the bleeding when his patient took a gasp of a breath and lunged forward. 

“No!” David cried in alarm trying to push him back down. 

Anton was by the man’s head trying not to pass out from the sight of so much blood, but acted quickly and pulled feebly at his shoulders to keep him down.

“Where is she?” the man ground out between his teeth.

“What?” David asked, stunned.

**Cora**

They had been walking for hours and her feet hurt, but she was contributing, damn it. Graham couldn’t hassle her anymore about being useless, sunning in a bikini on the beach and giving herself a pedicure to ease her stress while everyone else had wasted time sorting clothing from luggage. She felt bad about waiting in retrospect, but Graham didn’t understand how any of this made her feel. He never understood anything she did and never would.

She was helping now, and despite her feet, she wasn’t going to complain and give anyone the satisfaction. 

A clicking sound brought her attention to Jafar who had turned on the radio.

“Oh, now it’s convenient to you to turn it on,” Jefferson remarked rather loudly.

Jafar seemed not to hear him as he turned the dial on the top. There was a feminine mumbling followed by a beep, and Cora blinked. “It’s working?” she asked, hope blossoming in her chest as she neared Jafar to get a look and hear the mumbling better.

“What is that?” Killian asked. “French?”

Jafar groaned and frowned at the radio. “We can’t put out a message because there is already a message transmitting from somewhere. A stronger signal is blocking us.” The radio beeped again and the message repeated with the woman’s voice. A male, mechanical voice followed as it recited a long number in English, then the beep again. 

“What!” Regina asked, incited. “Well… make the other message stop!”

Jefferson frowned as he watched.

“It isn’t so easy. Where is the signal coming from?” Jafar asked rhetorically, shaking his head. 

“Cora speaks French,” Graham offered, his eyes lighting up as he looked at her eagerly.

“What? No I don’t,” she argued suddenly feeling attacked. 

“Yes, you do! You lived in France for a whole semester!”

“Yeah, drinking and trying to hook up with French guys at parties!” she argued. She couldn’t do this! They were all looking at her expectantly. It was too much to ask! What if she failed?

“You can do this, Cora. Just try,” Graham tried again, more gently.

“Is this island French owned?” Killian asked no one in particular.

Cora bit her lip as she put her hand out to Jafar. He set the radio in her hand and she held it to her ear, listening. Her heart was racing, but she focused, listening. “She’s saying… she’s… she’s trapped. The others… they’re all dead. It’s just her.” Taking a deep breath, she listened to the male voice repeat the number, the beep, then the message again. 

“That number,” Jafar said incredulously. “It increases with each replay.” He paused a moment as Cora strained to focus on the woman’s voice and not Jafar’s. 

The woman’s voice was easier to understand with each repetition. “She’s asking for help. For someone to find her.” 

“That message,” Jafar said as his eyes widened. “If I’m calculating it correctly, it’s been repeating for over sixteen years…”

Cora bit her lip and opened her eyes. “She says her name is Marie Blanc.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed. Please drop a comment, a heart, what you would like to see in the future, etc. Thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a [dear friend](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDarkOne/pseuds/TheDarkOne) who made the fantastic manipulation for this fanfic which I have added after posting this chapter. 
> 
> Thank you for reading! Enjoy.  
> -AA

[](https://ibb.co/dYPyrK)

**Killian**

“Her name is Marie Blanc,” Cora said as she handed the radio back to Jafar. As soon as it was taken, it made a fizzing sound before the screen went blank.

“That’s all. It’s dead.” Jafar turned the dial until it made a soft click.

Graham looked up at their surroundings. “Wonder what’s putting out the signal that was blocking it…” There were no towers anywhere within sight, yet the number of trees on the island concealed what might have been visible otherwise.

“It could be anywhere. We are high enough that we received the signal from anywhere within range of this location. It could be below us.” Jafar slipped the radio on his belt.

“Which means we climbed this high for no reason,” Jefferson grumbled to himself as he crossed his arms. His wristwatch beeped and he glanced at the face and frowned.

“Got somewhere to be?” Regina asked. “Running late for a date?” There was a snappish tone in her voice, but Jefferson didn’t seem to react with his quick temper as he had been doing thus far.

“Something like that,” he mumbled in distraction. “Let’s get going. Sun’s going to go down in a few hours.” He nodded at the afternoon sun and turned to head back the way they came.

As they walked, a few of them speculated on where the best place a French woman could have lived, how she had gotten there - plane or boat crash, perhaps - and if she was still alive. 

“We cannot tell the others what we heard. We do not fully understand what is going on. If we tell them, it will cause a panic,” Jafar said. Cora nodded in agreement as Jafar continued. “We tell them this, we take away hope and that is a dangerous thing to lose.”

A few nervous glances were passed between them as they continued on their path down the mountain.

“She could have been rescued by now. Sixteen years is… a long time to be stranded,” Killian guessed. He couldn’t imagine being trapped for more than half his own life in any single place. 

“Think she’s still sane?” Cora asked, as she skipped down a steeper part of the hill. “Sixteen years...”

Jefferson giggled, but kept his attention straight ahead on the trail. 

“What exactly do you find funny about this?” Regina asked him pointedly. 

He only shook his head and walked faster. 

“Only two days on the island, and that one’s already going crazy,” Cora said. Graham shot her a look and shook his head, but she shrugged her shoulders and widened her eyes at him. 

Jefferson, however, heard the remark and rounded on her which caused Cora to squeak and nearly fall in her focus on Graham. “I am _not_ crazy.” His eyes were large as he glared down at her. For a moment, Graham was too startled to react for the sake of his step-sister. Cora had been rude in saying it after all, but this guy had just been carrying around a loaded pistol and shot a bear. 

“Hey, man,” Graham tried pushing his way between them. “She didn’t mean it. It was a thoughtless remark.” He nudged Cora for an apology, but she only narrowed her eyes up at the taller man. 

“I don’t think the crazy man should keep the gun.” She crossed her arms over her chest, clearly not afraid to provoke said crazy man.

Jefferson looked as if he’d been betrayed with complete misunderstanding as he stared down at her face. His intimidation tactic wasn’t working. He didn’t say anything more, just pulled the pistol from his waistband and recklessly tossed it at Cora before turning around and stalking away.

“You shouldn’t have said that,” Graham told Cora. 

She looked as if her feathers had been ruffled, but she kept the indignant glare on her face as she watched after the way Jefferson had gone. 

“Should we wait, or…?” Killian asked, pointing after Jefferson’s retreating figure, but Regina shook her head. “No. He’ll figure it out.”

“I think Regina should have the gun,” Killian suggested. “I trust her.” She seemed more experienced, or more mature than the primadonna Cora seemed to be anyway.

Several of them nodded. Jafar agreed as well and handed the magazine to her. She gave them all a look of startlement as she took it. “Why?” 

“Because. You didn’t fire it when you had the chance.” Cora handed it to Regina with a faint smile.

**_Flashback_ **

**Regina**

A nudge to her side woke her. Opening her eyes, she noticed the sunlight streaming through the open door of the barn. A bulky figure to her side nudged her again. The muzzle of the bay horse wickered quietly as Regina reached up to touch the downy chin. 

Then a clearing of a throat behind her startled Regina enough that she rolled in the hay to notice the man pointing a shotgun at her. “You’re trespassing,” the Australian-accented man said as he frowned down at her. “And you’re lucky you weren’t trampled.”

“I know horses,” Regina said in explanation as she stood, brushing hay off of herself and picking up her backpack. “I’m sorry. I’ll be going.”

“Wait right there,” the man said raising the barrel of the gun towards her chest as she rose. “What’s ya name?”

“Roni,” she lied, watching him closely. 

“American?” he asked.

She shook her head. “Canadian. I’m a student, traveling abroad. Thought it would be fun, but I ran out of money. So…” She gestured at the horse who stuck his muzzle in her open palm.

“Ya hungry?” the man asked.

 

In his home, Regina devoured the plate of eggs and pancakes provided to her. She hadn’t eaten anything substantial in two days. 

“Where were you planning on traveling to?” the man asked as he scrubbed the cast iron skillet over the sink.

“Melbourne,” Regina said, barely taking time to swallow her food before she scooped up another bite of eggs. It was tactless, she knew, but she didn’t know this man and she was famished.

“That’s too far from here. At least a hundred kilometers.”

Regina shrugged and smiled. “I like to walk.” Truth was, she hadn’t realized she was that far away from Melbourne. It was just the nearest big city she knew about.

The man shook his head after giving her a look of judgement. “Do ya know how to work a horse ranch?”

Regina nodded, curious. “I do. I grew up on one.” That much was true, at least. 

“I need some help around here. Too many chores just for myself.” Regina believed it. The man looked to be pushing seventy. 

Nodding, she swallowed the last of the eggs and set her fork down. “I’d be glad to to repay you for the food you gave me, and lunch and dinner?” she added, hopeful for more time to lay low, to have someplace to be with a roof over her head.

**Graham**

A couple hours later, the sun was nearing the horizon and long shadows cast through the jungle making visibility too difficult. Jefferson had not returned. “We’ll stop here,” Graham suggested as he looked at the site. It was the first spot with level ground they had come to on their descent from the peak. “The cave will give us shelter. We can start a small fire for warmth without burning down the jungle.” He pointed at the rocks at the mouth of the cave. 

“Here?” Cora asked, outraged as she raised her lip at the rocky ground.

Graham shook his head as he squatted and began rounding some of the baseball sized rocks up to make a small circle for the fire. 

“I’m hungry,” Cora complained as she slumped down on a rock.

Jafar sat next to her and offered a packet of airline peanuts with a roll of his wrist. Cora snatched it greedily from his hand as she held it up to see it better in the diminishing light. 

_Funny. She had no interest in eating that same food the day before and that very morning. No wonder she was hungry,_ Graham mused as he brushed tinder into the circle. 

“I’ll share it with you…” Cora suggested. Graham looked up to see the uncommon, demure expression on his step-sister’s face as she looked at Jafar. The latter nodded once at her and smiled.

**David**

The Marshall had passed out again after his brief return to the land of the conscious. _’Where is she?’_ the Marshall had demanded on a rushed breath. 

Despite his attempts, David couldn’t get the name out of the man. She, who? Who should they be concerned about? Every time David asked, the man fainted again.

“Check his pockets,” David instructed Anton who was fumbling about by the Marshall’s head, unsure of what to do since the man had fainted again. Anton’s job had been to hold him still in case he should wake again while David was attempting to stitch the gaping hole in the man’s chest.

Nodding once, Anton shifted on his knees until he was opposite David, but closed one eye to avoid looking directly at the blood. The trouser pocket on his side contained nothing. Neither did the pocket nearest David. 

“That’s his jacket over there,” David said with a nod towards the blazer behind Anton. 

David was busy using salt water to wipe the dried blood from the man’s ribs. When the Marshall had sat up so quickly, he had popped his stitches and a gush of blood had rushed out of the gaping hole in his abdomen. He kept an eye on Anton, however, as he worked, just as curious about who this _she_ might be.

Anton produced a sheet of twice-folded paper. His eyes widened as he scanned the paper. “Oh, damn...!” he finally said as he glanced back up to David.

“What? Who is the criminal?” David asked impatiently.

“She’s dangerous,” the Marshall mumbled in his fevered sleep.

“It’s… Regina Mills.” Anton fumbled with the paper as he turned it around to show David. “What do you think she did?” He glanced back down at the computer print out of the mugshot of Regina Mills. “She looks pretty hardcore.”

David snatched the paper from Anton’s hands despite the blood on his fingers, and shoved it into his own pocket. “It’s not our business.

“But…” Anton started.

“Anton.” A pointed look shut Anton’s mouth as the taller man glanced back to the unconscious Marshall.

It turned out, upon further searching of the Marshall’s jacket, that his name was Keith Nottingham. His days were numbered. David didn’t have the proper tools to stop the bleeding, nor did he have the right antibiotics to fight the infection that was streaking red across his abdomen. Nottingham was coming in and out of consciousness as the day slipped into night. The pain was simply too much for him to bear. 

**Regina**

The next morning, Jefferson miraculously met back up with the other five just as the sounds of the ocean were within hearing distance. 

“Have a nice night alone in the jungle?” Regina asked him as they walked past the bamboo she had hidden behind the previous day. There was still some annoyance to her tone, but most of the fire had diminished in the night. She held the gun now, not him, and she did feel better with it. It still made no sense why these people trusted her. How had she proved herself trustworthy? But she hadn’t argued. 

“Just fantastic,” Jefferson smirked with a self-satisfied drawl. “Slept on my very own mattress and pillow while The ‘Stones rocked me to sleep. How was your night, Your Majesty?”

“Funny. And don’t call me that,” Regina snapped. He certainly was odd, but she wasn’t going to play into his teasing. She’d barely slept on dirt and rocks as the night creatures chirruped into a deafening roar, but she was damned certain that wherever Jefferson had been overnight, he had had just as fitful a night as she. 

Though, side-eyeing him as he walked beside her with that arrogant smirk on his face, he didn’t have a speck of dirt on himself like she did. In fact, he wore the same clothes as the day before, but his hair actually looked clean, washed, and brushed. 

“Oh, I love the Rolling Stones,” Killian piped in, jogging up to walk in between she and Jefferson. Good. Killian could deal with him, Regina figured. “What’s your favorite?” Killian asked.

_“‘Sympathy for the Devil,’”_ Jefferson answered immediately.

Killian nodded. “Aye. Good one, that.” He proceeded to sing the damned lyrics, _“Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of wealth and taste…”_

While Regina was irritated that someone was being friendly with the madman, she was instantly back with her roommate as they sang songs by The Villains and even The Stones when they had been in the mood for old rock. 

_“Pleased to meet you, hope you guessed my name!”_ Now Jefferson had joined in singing with Killian and it was more than Regina could handle. She stomped off towards the beach at a faster pace.

 

David was pacing between several other survivors asking if any of them had any or had found any knives or medical equipment in any of the bags. Regina approached him, but didn’t say anything until David looked her way. He looked tired. The man was in his fifties at least, but he’d been working all night on the damned Marshall by the shadows under his eyes. 

“Hey,” Regina said gently. “I need to tell you something.” 

David nodded, a tight smile on his face. “Okay.” He crossed his arms over his chest as he waited.

Regina checked around themselves to be sure no one would overhear as she waved him away from the gathering crowds that began to listen to Jafar as he explained that the hike proved the transceiver had picked up no signal. “We decided not to tell the other survivors this, but we couldn’t get a signal out. There’s some other stronger signal transmitting which blocked ours. Some French woman’s distress call for help. It’s been playing on repeat for sixteen years.”

David frowned, running his hand warily down his face. Maybe telling him was more burden than he needed to hear, but Regina thought of him more of the leader than herself even if those on the hike had voted her leader in a way. He wasn’t the convict after all.

“Anything else?” David asked her. 

She looked away from his searching eyes and briefly towards the Marshall’s make-shift hospital bed. Regina touched David’s arm. “Why don’t you take a break? I can go sit with the patient.”

David’s lips firmed into a line as he looked at her briefly before shaking his head. “I can’t do that. He’s going to die if I don’t get the right tools and medicines to save him. He’s lost a lot of blood. He’s woken a few times, but passed out again.”

Regina had to control her expression. This wasn’t the worst news she’d heard in the past day. In fact, it could be a very good thing. “Did he say anything?” she asked, but when David shook his head, she nodded. “Look, David, I know doctors swear to do no harm, but don’t you think… he’s suffered enough?”

David’s back straightened as he understood what she was suggesting. “I’m not a murderer. I saw your mugshot, Regina.” His eyes watched her as if he was trying to make a decision before his eyes met someone else passing by and waved half-heartedly at them. Regina followed his wave suspiciously to notice that Graham had walked by and caught the doctor’s attention. 

“I know,” he emphasized.

Regina held her arms. “Okay. So what’s next? You going to use those handcuffs on me?” She knew he had them. “Detain me until the rescue team shows up?”

It sounded ridiculous to his own ears. He wasn’t law enforcement. He was a doctor with no tools or medicine. What exactly could he do? He wasn’t anyone’s hero.

David looked down for only a beat before he met her eyes again. “I think we landed on this island for a reason. Everyone gets a chance to start over. Clean slate. Don’t you agree?”

Her mouth only slightly opened in shock. She’d heard those words before. Why was he saying this? Was this a trick? But of what she knew of David in the past two days, she had a feeling she could trust him. She hoped she wasn’t going to be fooled a second time.

**_Flashback_ **

She’d been working for the old man on his ranch for months. He’d kept his word and fed her for the work she had done. Even paid her modest wages, under the table at her insistence since she had told him she doesn’t trust banks. 

But now, it was time to go. It had been risky to stay in one place for so long. Eventually, word would have gotten around even to the remote horse ranch one hundred miles outside of Melbourne and she was more than surprised every morning when she woke up without the sound of sirens as a wake up call. 

She stuffed her wages in her backpack and carefully climbed down the stairs of the old farmhouse, avoiding the steps which she knew creaked. 

A light switched on in the kitchen just as her boot hit the last step. Sighing, Regina looked up to see the old man with a cup of coffee before him at the table. “Leaving without saying goodbye, Roni?” he asked quietly.

“I wrote a note,” she said, trying to avoid eye contact. She’d come to like the old guy. He was nice enough, didn’t bother her too much since she worked hard, and so far hadn’t turned her in. She at least owed him a note.

“It’s late. Why don’t you stay this one last night and I’ll take you wherever you want to go in the morning? I figured you had a bad breakup, maybe an abusive boyfriend. I understand. Everyone deserves a chance to start over.” 

Regina hesitated. She was ready now. But, it was a long walk which meant she’d be facing the foreseeable future in more barns if she was lucky or in the wide open. Australia’s wilderness wasn’t kind. Everything tried to kill people there, she’d learned. Spiders as big as her head, for one. “Okay,” she nodded and smiled. “One more night.”

 

The next morning, as they were driving to the train station, her friend and employer for the past several months kept looking in his rear view mirror. “What are you looking at?” she asked as she turned around in the seat to notice a black, official looking vehicle tailing them closely. 

He didn’t answer at first. “How long have you known?” she asked slumping back into her seat as she wondered what the hell she was going to do.

“Only a little while. I need the reward money for the farm. It wasn’t an easy decision. I like you…”

“But you need the money,” Regina repeated his words and crossed her arms over her chest as she glanced in the side mirror. The truck behind them sped up, the engine roaring as it sidled up next to them, and the face of a leering Marshall Nottingham grinned at her. _’Caught you,’_ his lips mouthed.

**_Present Day_ **

Regina sat beside the Marshall as she studied him sleeping. The gun was in the back of her waistband and felt heavy as it dug into her skin. David was right; he had lost a lot of blood. The bits of gauze that poked out of Nottingham’s abdomen was becoming red with blood even now. He was going to die and likely soon. David had told her she had the chance to start over, but what if Nottingham told more people? David couldn’t hold back a mob against her, surely. 

She saw the Marshall’s jacket and reached over him to lift it up. Suddenly, Nottingham moved, his fingers digging into her neck. Regina gasped as his eyes bored into hers. His fingers dug harder as he gritted his teeth, straining all of his strength into his grasp. Spots floated before her eyes as she feebly slapped at him trying to hit his bandaged side, anything to make him stop.

A quick yell of, “Hey!” from David and Regina was released. She gasped as she stood, backing away from Nottingham. The Marshall’s eyes rolled up and he started shaking. 

Regina still clutched one hand to her throat, the jacket in her other hand as she backed away. David was hunched over the convulsing man as he worked trying to stabilize him, but Regina couldn’t stand there another moment. She ran. 

**David**

The moaning from the makeshift hospital was growing louder. David didn’t know what else he could do. He couldn’t consider Regina’s advice of euthanizing the man; he couldn’t do that. He’d never willingly done such a thing and he couldn’t do it now either. Even if all the odds pointing towards the man’s imminent death. What he needed was some damned antibiotics! Something so simple could save him if they were back in civilization!

Several of the survivors were eying David as they hurried past the dying man’s cot. Some averted their eyes, some glared in the dying man’s direction with growing resentment. “I wish he would just die,” he heard a bothered Cora tell Graham as she slumped with a pout in the sand next to her step-brother. 

“You have no heart,” Graham said with a shake of his head as he searched through the suitcase before him.

The luggage on the beach had been and was still being searched by Anton’s crew, but the only sort of antibiotic or medication they’d been able to find so far was for foot fungus and a near empty tube of oral lidocaine. Upon asking Anton to search the luggage from the fuselage overhead compartments, Anton had visibly shaken. “But… but the bodies. They’re still in there.”

“Yeah?” David asked as he eyed the man, hands on his hips as he squinted up at him in the bright sunlight. 

Anton was shaking his head as he looked with forlorn displeasure towards the wreckage. “But… they’re dead,” he started again, but David clapped him on the shoulder. 

“Look, why don’t you go over there and see if they need any help. I’ll take care of it, okay?” 

Anton nodded gratefully, jogging off as quickly as he could before David could change his mind.

The fuselage was nearly completely upside down which made his climb into it pretty easy. The detritus littering the ceiling ranged from toys, to airline blankets, dried vomit, and of course the bodies of passengers that didn’t survive the crash, still buckled in and upside down. David kept his eyes averted and on the storage bins, pulled the luggage free and unzipped one after the other. A penlight held in his mouth with the beam pointed into each suitcase provided enough light, but it also meant he had to breathe through his mouth so that he wouldn’t smell the stench from the effects of two days of humidity on corpses. 

He was reading the label on one orange pill bottle when he heard a noise in the plane with him. One of the oxygen masks dangled and shifted in a non-existent breeze. David looked up but saw nothing, so he went back to his task. A creak and a shift caught his attention again. He stood quickly ready to face whatever it was - walking dead, suggested his overactive imagination thanks to Anton’s fear - when Jefferson popped up from behind a wall.

“What the hell are you doing in here, Jefferson?” he asked on a rush of breath.

“Oh, just trick or treating. Same as you,” he said casually with a wide grin as he perched up higher than David.

“You’re looting from the dead.”

“Ahh,” Jefferson grumbled with a wave of dismissal. “If that’s what you call it. I call it saving up for a rainy day. Found some smokes, food, entertainment. What’ve you found?” There was no remorse in his tone at all, David noted.

“Medicine,” he answered flatly as he turned away from Jefferson to continue searching through the bag he’d left open. He couldn’t even look at this guy. “Is this your modus operandi? Stealing from the dead?”

“Wake up, David,” Jefferson said as he jumped down from his perch with the backpack in tow. “It’s been too many days.”

“Two. Two days,” David argued. 

Jefferson made a rude noise and continued. “No one is coming. We’re trapped. This is how we survive.” He raised up the bag. “That man you’ve been trying to save is going to die. You’re wasting your time.”

David groaned, trying his best to ignore the jabs. 

“You haven’t opened your eyes to this island yet, Doc. You’re still living in civilization,” Jefferson drawled as he strolled past where David kneeled.

“Oh? And where are you living, Jefferson?”

“Me? I’m in Wonderland.” He grinned again so widely, David narrowed his eyes as if he could almost see a Cheshire’s grin on the other man’s face. Was he enjoying being shipwrecked? Or was he just enjoying taunting someone that was working hard and fighting to help them all survive? David would bet on the latter. No one could be that happy to be stranded.

Jefferson chuckled at David before turning and leaving the fuselage with his bag of stolen goods.

**Emma**

The luggage detail had been working most of the day on whatever had been dragged out of the belly of the fuselage. It hadn’t been very easy considering the fact that the fuselage was upside down, but as Anton had fervently noted more than once, at least they didn’t have to see any bodies in the luggage hold area.

Emma got tired of sorting through dead people's’ luggage, too; it made her feel things she really didn’t want to feel, especially with pregnancy hormones raging through her body. So, she walked through the sand to find Killian struggling to pull a suitcase on one of the concierge carts. The wheels weren’t moving very well through all that sand which would explain all the grunting Killian was doing. 

“Let me help you.” Emma chuckled as she grabbed the handrail of the cart opposite of Killian.

“Thanks,” he said after looking up to see that she’d joined him. His smile with bright and happy. Just what Emma needed at the moment after all that gloom in looking through dead people’s stuff. 

As they pulled together, Killian spoke up first. “So, um, your husband. Was he on the flight?”

Emma shook her head. “No. I’m not married.” _Thankfully,_ she added silently. “I’m not the marrying type.” When Killian grinned at her, Emma rolled her eyes, tugging harder on the cart. “I know. Eighteen, pregnant, and unmarried. So unconventional of me.” Her free hand rested under her belly. 

Killian merely shook his head, still looking at her as they pulled the cart until it caught on something and they both nearly tripped. They both laughed as they righted themselves. “Bloody men. They’re useless anyway,” he said, earning another laugh from Emma. He wrapped his arms around the heavy suitcase and nearly fell again as he tossed it down in the sand. 

**David**

The sound of a gunshot silenced the moaning with a deafening crack. David was up and running immediately to find Jefferson walking away from the Marshall’s cot. “What did you do!?” David yelled as he grabbed Jefferson by the front of his shirt and shook him.

The other man’s face was wrought with emotion as he stared back at David, stubbornly not saying anything. “What did you do?” David demanded again. “Why did you shoot him?”

Regina stepped out of the shadowed treeline, empty handed. “He didn’t. I asked him to do it. He refused. So I did what neither of you could.”

David released his grip on Jefferson’s shirt and backed away from him, shaking his head. He’d told her she deserved a chance to start over, and this was what she did with it? 

“He wanted this!” Regina insisted. “He asked me to do it.”

There was a wheezing gasp from the ground and David started. The wheeze had a rattle to it. His hands ran along the body until he saw the hole just a little too low in the chest. “You shot him in the lung!”

“No! I shot him in the heart!” Regina cried, uncertainty tinting her insistence. 

There was no time for this. The man was going to suffocate in his own blood on top of the suffering he’d already been under for two days. “It’s going to take hours for him to bleed to death now!” David yelled at Regina. 

Her hands were shaking as she stared at the dying man. “I… He was suffering.” She looked down at her empty hands. “I only had one bullet left.”

“And now?” David shook his head. There was nothing more he could do. Nothing! He balled his fist and punched the ground. Regina let out a sob and stepped away leaving he and the drowning man alone. The gasps and choking were all David could hear. No choice left. This was the end.

So, David did the only thing he could do. He put his hands, which were meant to heal, over Nottingham’s mouth and pinched his nose, and waited and held his own breath as he squeezed his eyes shut so he wouldn’t have to see the man jerk beneath his hands.

No more than a minute later, he stumbled away from the cot, breathing deeply and panting in the humid air. Jefferson and Regina were standing together, their backs to the death behind them, his arm looped around her shoulders. She looked small for the first time, in David’s eyes, but that was the only glance David spared either of them as he lumbered past and towards the ocean. 

He sat for hours, through the night, and into the next morning, simply staring at the waves as they lapped gently on the beach. 

Eventually, Regina came to join him. “It’s time I tell you what I did.” She tucked her knees up with her arms around them as she stared ahead.

David shook his head. “None of that matters anymore. Who we were, what we did before? We all died three days ago in that crash. We all get to start over.”

She sat silent for a while, so that David had to look at her. She was staring at him in wonder, and for a moment, he thought she might say something he didn’t want to hear. _None of that hero stuff again, please._ He couldn’t take it after what he’d had to do.

Finally, Regina nodded. “Okay.”

**-x-**

Neal played on the beach, laughing with his dog. Gold sat smiling in the shade for a while until he stood to jog towards his son, his hands out for the small coconut he’d been using as a tennis ball.

Robyn found Alice asleep under a scrap of metal and grinned at how beautiful she looked with her hair spilling over her cheek. She ran a finger lightly along the tendril to tuck it behind her ear. Alice’s lips quirked up in the faintest of grins as she slept.

Graham offered Cora a large, floppy hat befitting a socialite. She took it and looked after him in gratitude as he continued on.

Emma sat in the sand with the gentle waves breaking over her toes; her hand cupping her belly as she felt the little jabs of feet against her palm. A smile slowly spread across her face. 

Killian and Jafar were handing out candy they had found in the luggage. Something as simple as a lollipop could bring the brightest smiles of joy even from the oldest of the survivors. When Jafar passed Jefferson who sat with his head hung as he looked at his hands, Jefferson looked up just in time to catch an unopened box of tea packets tossed his way. Jafar inclined his head at him, and Jefferson attempted a smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Your thoughts? Please leave a comment! They're really encouraging for more frequent updates. Thanks for reading!_


	4. Chapter 4

[](https://ibb.co/dYPyrK)

**David**

There was a horrible noise coming from the fuselage on the fourth night after the crash. After being awoken by the noise of Gold’s dog madly barking at whatever was thrashing about in the plane, the survivors slowly began to stand from their sleeping pallets on the beach to gather near. 

“What is it?” Emma asked as she stepped up beside David. It was difficult to hear her while Neal struggled to keep the barking dog back with the leash. “Something’s in there.”

“Some _one’s_ in there,” Anton corrected her.

“There are just dead bodies in there,” David tried to assure them to keep them from getting scared. “It’s probably Jefferson.” Did the guy know no end to his looting?

“I’m behind you, jerk.” David glanced over his shoulder to see the sour look Jefferson cast him before turning his eyes back towards the fuselage. 

Only the small campfires provided enough light for anyone to see the outer shell of the fuselage, not what was within.

David stepped closer, holding up his small penlight. Jefferson followed just behind him with Killian and Regina in the rear. The rooting around continued within the dark interior. The only thing David could see inside was a hand dangling down from one of the seats when they were close enough. 

“I’ve got this,” Jefferson said as he fished a flashlight from his own pocket.

“Wait,” David whispered, holding out his hand, but Jefferson ignored him, of course, and shone the beam within. The rooting sound stopped as two beady eyes reflected back at them from a squat, hairy body. “Run!” he yelled when he realized what it was.

The four ran just as a boar jumped out with a human hand in its mouth. Screams tore through the quiet night air as people dove out of the way in horror.

“Now what?” Anton moaned before jogging away. 

Alice and Robyn climbed over a wing. Jafar helped Emma get back. Jefferson and Regina hunched by a campfire. Killian tripped and David dragged him back.

The squealing of two boars veered toward the jungle.

“They’re gone,” Jafar announced as he stood.

Killian pulled himself up out of the sand and watched towards the treeline. “What the bloody hell was that?” He felt a sting on his side and touched it only to find that he’d been cut by some metal in the sand when he tripped.

“Boars.” Gold was standing beside Neal. The dog had calmed down, finally, and was panting as he watched as well.

“We need to burn the fuselage,” David decided.

Anton cringed as he wrung his hands. “Dude…”

“Exactly,” David said as he watched the shadowed figure of the second boar disappear into the thick jungle.

“But… they’re people,” Regina said, wrinkling her nose as she stared at David.

“Yes,” Jafar nodded. “They deserve better than that. Their burial rights, their religions...”

They weren’t seeing the big picture in this, so David shook his head. “The boars are developing a taste for human flesh and once the bodies are gone, they’re going to start coming after us. If we bury them, they won’t stay buried long.” David looked around at all of them as they were clearly uncomfortable. “We don’t have the luxury of burial rights. It’s been four days.” He let that sink in and no one argued. “We’ll gather wood in the morning and light the fire tomorrow night.”

“Why tomorrow night? Why not sooner?” Killian asked.

“He hopes someone will see it,” Regina said. David met her eyes and turned away.

 

As David was stitching up Killian’s side with the flashlight propped up and pointing at the gash, Gold approached, fidgeting with his fingers again. “There’s the matter of the boar in the jungle. It’s already had the taste of human flesh, and my boy is wont to wander with his dog.”

“Okay?” David shook his head with a distant tone. “What do you want from me?”

Gold frowned at David. “Someone needs to hunt it.”

David raised his eyebrows at Gold. “I’m not a hunter.”

“But… but you’re the leader here, surely you...,” Gold tried again, but David continued to shake his head. 

“I’m not the leader. I’m not a hunter. That’s not me.” He shifted so that he could look closer at the wound he was stitching to make it clear to Gold he didn’t want to discuss it any longer. 

Killian remained quiet, thankfully not adding his unwanted opinion to the table. He simply sat there with his t-shirt half hiked up over his shoulder while David worked on his side.

**Gold**

The young woman from the boulder was walking by with flowers in her hands and Gold saw an opportunity as he trudged through the sand towards her. “Excuse me!” he called waving in her direction. 

She stopped and smiled brightly at him before casting a look over her shoulder. He was glad it was the friendlier of the two for what he wanted to ask. He recalled the other woman’s name was Robyn as this one had called her.

“Ah, you see, I… I’m going into the jungle. The boars from last night. And I… I’m going to… to…”

“Hunt?” the girl suggested.

Gold nodded, relieved. “Yes. Yes, or at least, I hope to. And my son, his name is Neal. There he is now.” Gold pointed in the direction of Neal with Rumples, the service dog, as they sat in the shade. “Would ye mind looking after him? Just until I come back?” He tried a smile of reassurance that he would come back, but even he didn’t fully believe it. He could be impaled by one of those tusks. 

He was about to tell the woman nevermind because it truly was a foolish idea for him to go into the jungle to hunt a boar so that it wouldn’t end up hunting his son. Why had he even suggested such a thing?!

But the woman nodded and looked over to Neal. “I’d love to. I’m Alice.” There was an incline to her speech as if she was asking a question. She shot her hand out, momentarily startling him, until he realized she was simply trying to shake his hand.

He put out his hand which she took eagerly and pumped twice in an overly-friendly gesture that caused him to stutter again. “Oh, I’m… I’m Gold.” He nodded, pleased that he’d had the ability to get the name out. “Thank you. I won’t be gone long.” 

Alice bit her lip as she waved him off with a carefree smile of her own and skipped toward Neal and Rumples.

**_Flashback_ **

Robert Gold sat behind his office desk of the paper company in which he worked. A stack of mail was dropped on his desk directly over his hands and keyboard as he typed. Glancing up, he cast as sardonic a glare as he dared as the mail clerk continued on. 

Leafing through the mail, one piece of junk mail stood out in vibrant colors which contrasted so with his bland office, that he picked it up and marvelled at the envelope before tearing it open. 

_Aboriginal Healing in the Outback of Australia!_ The ad boasted of nature’s healing for all ailments. At a meager sum of all of the contents of his future retirement plan, he could walk again without pain, run with his son Neal, shove it in his ex-wife’s face when he showed her how he wasn’t a useless coward any longer.

He tapped the ad upon the desk, thinking. He could do it. It was worth it. 

**Graham**

“That woman over there,” Graham said as he sat down next to Cora who was busy painting her fingernails again. “She just sits by herself most of the time.”

“Mhm,” Cora said without looking up.

“Her name is Aurora. I was trying to give her CPR after we crashed.”

“Yeah.” 

Graham looked away from the solitary woman staring at the ocean by herself and turned an incredulous look on Cora. “Are you listening to me? Someone needs to go talk to her.”

She finally looked at him then with a squint against the glare. She must have lost the floppy hat he’d found for her. “Why don’t you do it? Save the day and earn more points.” 

Graham stood up and glared down at her. “I’m trying to find some food for everyone. We’re almost out. Meanwhile, you’re sitting here on your ass!”

“We aren’t going to starve. There are plenty of fish in the ocean.” She flung a hand out towards the waters behind him.

“Right. I’d like to see you catch a fish.” He turned away from her to go speak to Aurora himself if Cora was too busy to do it.

“You think I can’t?” she yelled at his retreating back.

Before he made it to Aurora, screaming caught his attention from the opposite direction and he ran to see what was going on. Several people were pointing towards the ocean. “She’s drowning!” someone yelled.

Graham saw the flailing arms. Whoever ‘she’ was, she was so far away, he could barely hear the cries for help. So, he ran through the crashing waves and dove in when the water became too deep to run through. Arm over arm, he swam, bobbed up to gauge his distance, and altered course when the current was sending him too quickly away from the flailing arms. 

Maybe it was a rip current, but Graham found it increasingly difficult to get near enough. Still, he persisted until he saw the arm slip lifelessly below the water. “No!” he choked over the water as he still tried to reach the island’s next victim. He had no idea how far away he was from her. She was just gone.

And then an arm went around his own chest and yanked him backwards. Graham tried to fight it, but the other swimmer was stronger and had fought less with the current. When he found his feet again among the crashing waves, Aurora was there to help David pull Graham out. Graham yanked his arm away from David and stumbled; he was so winded from fighting the current. 

Before David could say anything, Graham shot back, “I was trying to save her and now she’s dead! Why didn’t you save her? You should have left me! I could have made it back!” 

“You were drowning!” David shook his head. “So no, I didn’t save her! And neither did you!” He pushed past Graham and Aurora.

“David!” he yelled as he stumbled through the sand after him. “Who voted you the leader here? You think you’re a bloody hero?”

David stopped retreating to look back at Graham but something over his shoulder caught his attention because the doctor was still not listening at all. He was running away from him. “David!” Graham yelled again.

**David**

Graham was completely out of his focus now. He was certain he saw Spencer again and the man was staring at him from the trees. 

When David started running, Spencer turned around and disappeared through the foliage. So, David ran faster, past other survivors who were arguing over the last remaining food items. None of that mattered now more than the supposed dead man walking around on the island in his funeral suit!

When David burst through the tree line, his eyes widened in shock to see his step-father still standing there. He hadn’t evaded his site or faded into a hallucination like before. David crept closer, his heart hammering in his chest as he wondered if this was real or was it someone else who looked like him? _How could this be real? I saw him at the funeral home! Dead!_

Just when his fingers were a millimeter away, the figure turned around to stare at him. David was so shocked that he stumbled and fell backwards in the sand as he gaped up at Albert Spencer in the flesh. This was him! 

He tried to call out, but at first, words failed him. Spencer didn’t wait. He turned and walked away through the foliage again before David could find his feet again.

**_Flashback_ **

David’s face was throbbing, but he straightened his back, clenched his fist and swung again, fist making contact with his assailant’s jaw. His friend needed his help and he wasn’t going to let him fight that jerk alone.

Later when David got home, his step-father, Albert Spencer, caught him trying to sneak up to his room. “Do you think you’re some kind of hero?” Before David could answer, he was cut off with a sharp word. “Stop. When you fail, you don’t have what it takes to be a hero.”

He’d heard that so often, he could believe it, but in the heat of the moment, in a fight, he knew he couldn’t stand back and do nothing.

**_Island_ **

David ran after the direction he saw Spencer go. But any direction he looked, he saw no more than a leaf blow in the non-existent breeze. “Where are you?” David shouted towards the sky. 

He kept walking, half-jogging when he saw a movement from the corner of his eye, but every time he looked for it, the figure was gone again. 

“Rationalize,” he told himself. “I’m a doctor. I’m smarter than this. Albert Spencer is dead. I saw the body. I’m just dehydrated. And tired after that swim.”

Wiping the beading sweat from his forehead, he returned to the beach.

**Regina**

“I’m going with you,” Regina said as she stepped up behind David who was changing out of a wet shirt. “What the hell happened to you?” she asked just realizing.

“Nothing,” David said quickly. “Where do you think I’m going?” he asked as he turned around, pulling the clean t-shirt down.

“To hunt the boar? You are going, aren’t you?”

David shook his head. “No. I have things I need to do here. You need to see Gold and Graham. Graham is the wildlife expert. Gold is going because… well, he seems he has something to prove.”

“Okay, then I’m going with them.” Regina held up a metal rod of sorts. “Jafar gave me this antenna to put at higher grounds. Maybe a tree. It will help us figure out where this French woman’s signal is coming from.”

David nodded at it and bent to pick up a backpack. “Okay.” He walked off and away from her without another word. 

“What’s gotten into you?” she wondered to herself as she watched him leave. He was usually into everything, but now, he seemed aloof.

 

She found Gold and Graham looking over a case of knives. They had found them in someone’s luggage, evidently. Gold nodded to Regina when he realized she was standing there. He plucked one of the knives from the case and reached for a bamboo pole and began wrapping a vine around it. “What exactly do you think you’re going to do?” Regina asked with incredulity. “Spear a boar as it’s charging you?” She let out a laugh.

“You’re certainly welcome to distract it for me.” Gold glanced away from the spear to observe Regina’s disbelieving stare.

Regina shook her head and looked to Graham, but the other man was slipping a few knives into his own belt. 

“Okay, whatever. I’m going with you because I need to put this antenna up somewhere high.”

“While he’s hunting the boar, I’m going to look for food and fresh water sources. We’re running low. With as many survivors as we have...” He frowned as he looked down to the case before him and flipped the cover closed. Graham shoved the remaining knife into his backpack and slung it over his shoulder.

 

After they had hiked for some time, Regina found a tree with enough strong branches that she figured it would be a good tree to climb. While up among the branches, she struggled with the twine that was meant to secure the antenna to the tree. She was already on a precarious perch which meant she had to hold on to the tree with one arm while trying to loop the twine around the branch with the other hand. 

A roaring siren howled through the otherwise quiet jungle. “Shit!” she hissed as she looked around. Holding onto a branch to keep from falling, she glanced around herself and down below but couldn’t see it. And that was when the antenna slipped from her grasp and fell to the ground.

As fast as she could, she jumped down branch to branch. Halfway down, she saw something black shoot past below her. She froze. _What the hell is that?_ she wondered in growing horror. The roaring siren noise had come from that… thing.

Her eyes followed the path of the black smoke monster to see that it suddenly stopped. And Gold was standing there staring at it face-to...smoke. The smoke roiled and shifted within itself as if it was contained somehow, but Gold seemed to be hypnotized by it. 

Regina wasn’t waiting another second. She leaped down from the branches and landed in the peat expecting to still see Gold or maybe his bloodied corpse like what happened to the pilot, but she saw nothing. She was alone.

**Cora**

She was determined to prove Graham wrong. She could catch fish. It was easy enough to catch the attention of men. How much harder could it be to catch fish? She just needed the right kind of bait.

Walking along the beach, she saw so many people gathering firewood or being busy doing _something_ and Cora was getting frustrated. Everyone had someone else’s attention. There had to be someone…

And then she saw Killian by himself just inside the treeline. He was sitting on a rock with some kind of plastic bag in his hand as he shook it. Whatever he was doing didn’t matter to Cora. He was a man and he was alone. Good enough.

“Hey!” she called cheerfully. 

Killian jerked as his fingers closed around the plastic bag. Cora smiled at him as he shoved it into his pocket. “Um, hey. Hi,” he said back with a forced smile and stood up.

“Are you busy? I was… uh, wondering if you wanted to go for a walk with me?”

“Oh. Me? Aye, I’ll go.” With the dumbest expression on his face, Killian followed Cora out of the treeline and onto the beach.

“So, I had a question,” Cora started, but Killian laughed and interrupted.

“I knew it. I knew this would come up. Yes, I’m the bass player…,” he started but Cora wasn’t about to let him make this about himself.

“I was wondering if you know anything about fishing?”

Killian blinked at Cora, and realizing the subject had completely shifted away from himself, eventually nodded. “Aye. My father was a sailor and taught me everything he knew including how to fish. He’s dead now,” he shrugged, “But aye, everything he knew, I know. And I can help…”

“Great.” Cora smiled.

**David**

“David!” Regina’s voice called. David turned around to look at her with indifference, but upon seeing the alarm on her face, he approached and noticed Regina supporting Graham’s weight as they lumbered out of the treeline. “What happened?”

Regina was supporting Graham’s weight, and he saw the piece of fabric used as a tourniquet around his upper thigh. 

“Graham got attacked by the boar,” Regina gasped under the weight of Graham.

“I’m okay,” Graham winced, but by the pain etched upon his face, he looked anything but okay.

David took Graham’s other arm around his shoulder to help him to one of the plane seats under a tarp David had begun to use as an aid station.

“What about Gold? Where is he?” The other man hadn’t returned with them. 

Graham frowned, but Regina was the one who spoke up. “I saw it, David. It’s a smoke monster. And it… it stopped right in front of Gold.”

“Is he dead?” After what happened to the pilot, he was certain they had lost a second person in one day.

She shrugged looking away from him. “There wasn’t time. It came upon him so quickly.”

David puzzled at that as he looked towards the jungle but what he saw made him frown. “What?” he whispered and took a step forward.

Regina turned to look after him, but didn’t see anything. “What is it?”

But David found himself speechless and ran.

Regina was close on his heels. “What did you see?”

But he couldn’t answer. He didn’t want to sound crazy, not that Regina would know who Albert Spencer was, and he didn’t have time to answer.

Dodging around trees, he saw the movement again and changed direction, pursuing. “Hey!” he shouted. Maybe the sound of his voice would make Spencer stop.

But David stopped suddenly and Regina collided with his back. There was Gold covered in blood and dragging the carcass of the boar behind him. He was winded, but he certainly wasn’t dead as Regina had assumed.

“Gold?” David asked as he breathed heavily through the humid air looking between him and the dead beast. It had cuts all along its body. In a way, it almost looked as torn up as the pilot had. 

Regina was gaping at him, too. “The smoke monster? What happened?”

“Hm?” Gold asked as he continued walking in the direction of the beach, one of the boar’s legs in hand. 

“I saw you staring at it!” Regina demanded as she followed alongside him before she grabbed one of the legs to help.

David glanced around himself wildly for any sign of Spencer. There was no other movement between the trees, but he couldn’t ask Gold if he had seen anyone else walking around. It made no sense. He had to have hallucinated again.

“I saw no monster.” Gold said as he continued his laborious trek towards the beach.

David remembered Graham’s injury and felt ashamed of himself for leaving him for a fool’s chase. He followed back to the beach to tend to Graham. His leg had a gash in it from a tusk. “You’re lucky.” David told him after ripping the canvas of his cargo pants to see the wound better. “Two inches to the left and you’d already be dead. On top of that, you nearly drowned a few hours ago. Better take it easy.”

“I don’t feel very lucky,” Graham said, wincing at the pressure of the needle pricking through his skin. Graham was glaring at David, he was sure, but David ignored any looks. At least he wasn’t going on about that _hero_ nonsense again. 

**Killian**

“Hey!” Killian looked up to see a young boy jogging towards him. He was Gold’s boy, he was certain. The dog wasn’t in tow, Killian realized when he looked around the boy and didn’t see the familiar shadow.

“Aye? What’s amiss, lad?” 

“That pregnant lady?” The boy stopped before him, panting with exertion in the heat as he turned to point towards the plane’s wing. “She fell down over there. She isn’t moving.”

Killian tossed down the firewood he had been carrying and ran.

He dropped to his knees beside Emma. She had collapsed in the sun, but wasn’t sweating. Her skin was clammy to the touch. She needed water, fresh water, but there were none to be seen. 

“Emma!” he patted her face and felt her neck. Her pulse was there. “Emma! Wake up, love.” He gave her shoulders a shake and her eyes fluttered. Killian cupped her cheek, trying to keep her attention even as her eyes were closing again. “Emma! You collapsed.”

“Wha--,” she mumbled, but she didn’t seem capable of focusing on him. 

“She fainted?” Jafar was there, and when Killian confirmed what happened, the two carried Emma to the shade to keep her out of the sun. 

“We need water,” Killian told Jafar. “There was a case here not half an hour ago.”

Jafar shifted a glance away. “We are out. If the other forty-six find out, it is going to get much worse.”

Carefully, Killian shifted until he could get out from beneath Emma. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, love.” He hoped she could hear him. “I’ll go find the doctor.”

 

David was nearby with Graham stitching up his leg. “Doc!” Killian yelled as he jogged up to them. “Emma’s fainted. She needs water.”

Graham winced as he looked at Killian and then shifted his gaze towards where Killian had come from. “I was attacked before I could find any water. ”

“After I finish with Graham, I’ll go and look. The boar is dead now. It should be safe.” David inclined his chin in the direction of Gold who was busy starting a fire for the boar meat. “We’ll have food in a few hours.”

“We need water now,” Killian insisted. “She’s pregnant.”

Graham nodded. “Find Cora. She might have a little water left. It’s something at least until we can get more.”

Killian nodded and went in search of Cora.

He didn’t find Cora, but he did find two women who had a single empty Oceanic Air water bottle between them. 

“Where did you get this?” Killian asked as he snatched it from one of them.

“‘Scuse me?” the taller of the two said as she looked up at him and snatched it back. 

“The water,” he said with emphasis. “I need some now and I can’t find any. Do you have any more?”

The shorter of the two shook her head. “No, but we got it from over there. Maybe there’s more?”

Killian followed the gesture to the space Jefferson had been hanging around. There was a wall of suitcases providing some privacy. Maybe he’d been hoarding water among all the other things he had. 

“Thank you, ladies,” Killian bobbed his head quickly before jogging toward Jefferson’s space. The Alice book was still there, tented open open to hold a place, but no Jefferson. 

Killian flipped one suitcase open, then the next, and the next. All he was finding were clothes, a box of tea, a few metal cups, plasticware, magazines, and other things that were not water! “Bloody hell!” he grumbled as he shoved the wall of suitcases over. 

He needed to find Cora. To hell with her fish request. Emma needed water.

**Alice**

“We never socialize with anyone. I feel isolated here, Robyn.” Alice nudged Robyn’s shoulder only to receive a squinted eye back. 

“We don’t need anyone else. There’s no need to get to know these people. We’ll get out of here soon and then we’ll never see these people again.” Robyn kicked at a seashell and handed the half-full water bottle to Alice.

“But, I want to get to know them. I want to help. I need to know what to do.”

Robyn shifted to circle her arms around Alice’s waist. “If you need something to do, I’ll help you find something to do. We’ll be fine, just the two of us.” Robyn cupped Alice’s cheek and Alice sighed, looking away.

**David**

The earlier sight of Albert Spencer, only to run into Gold, was bothering David. The other man’s denial of seeing Regina’s smoke monster was also bothering him. Something was going on with Gold and David meant to find out.

“What’s going on about this smoke monster Regina mentioned?” David asked Gold as he wearily sat beside the other man. Gold was slicing hunks of meat from the boar’s thick hide and impaling it on bamboo skewers. 

“How should I know?” he said casually, his focus on his work. “Why don’t you ask her?”

David tried again. “She said it stopped right in front of you. That you were staring back at it.”

Gold shook his head. “What is this really about, David? Just say it. I’m listening.”

That took David aback as he narrowed his eyes. “Okay.” He shifted on his seat. “I’m chasing someone.” This was utterly ridiculous to say aloud and he knew it, but Gold was watching him now, listening.

Gold set down the skewer he was working on. “It sounds as if you’re chasing after the White Rabbit from Alice in Wonderland.” He nodded as if that explained everything.

David shifted back as he looked at Gold. What an odd thing to say. Was he lying about the smoke monster? Instead of accusing, David figured he may as well go with it. “Wonderland,” he laughed sardonically and rubbed his hand down his face before grinning back at Gold. “That’s the thing because he’s not there.”

“But you saw him?” 

David laughed again at how this sounded coming from himself. “Yes, but he’s not there.”

“What would you, as a doctor, say to me if I said the same thing happened to me?”

“I would say that you’re dehydrated, post traumatic stress, over-worked, and running off of too few hours of sleep. It’s simply a hallucination and it will go away with hydration and proper rest.” That wasn’t so difficult. It was easier to accept treating it as a diagnosis. 

“Fine. You’re hallucinating.” Gold leaned closer to speak in a quieter tone. “But what if you aren’t? What if it really is this man?”

“Then we’re all in trouble.” The smile David gave Gold was not in humor.

Gold sighed. “I’m not a believer in magic, Doc. But this place,” he gestured around themselves, “It’s special, different. Can you feel it? The magic of the island?”

David watched Gold’s eyes light with an expression that told David that he absolutely believed what he was saying. 

Gold continued. “Is your White Rabbit merely a hallucination? Perhaps. But what if we landed here for a reason. This person you’re chasing could be here.”

“No, it’s not possible,” David tried to argue.

“And if it is?”

“Then… what do I do when I catch him?”

Gold leaned back and smiled. “That is entirely up to you. But I’ve seen into the eye of this island. And it’s very bonny.”

That… that just topped the list of the oddest thing David had heard yet since crashing on the island, but he couldn’t put a finger on why. Perhaps it was on a spiritual level for Gold that David didn’t understand, but he couldn’t argue with it.

Gold only gave David a strange look before returning his attention to the boar. 

**Gold**

_**Flashback** _

The opportunity to go to Australia came faster than Gold expected. His ex-wife died of an untimely heart attack while vacationing with her new lover in Australia. Since she had not remarried nor made a new will, all of her possessions were to go to Neal. Gold was also her next of kin, as it seemed. He had to go identify the body. There was no word on where her lover had gone, nor did Gold care.

It was the last thing he wanted to do - take Neal to identify his mother’s body - but since he and Neal had no other living relatives, Neal went along. Identifying Milah’s body had been bittersweet in a way. He spared no love for the woman any longer as she had traded him in for a younger, taller, more robust man that had no debilitating pain in his legs, most likely. But, Milah had given Gold his son, and without her, he never would have known what it truly meant to love unconditionally and with his whole heart. Neal was everything to him, and for that alone, he had Milah to thank. 

Before leaving Scotland, he dug through his desk drawer at work to retrieve the pamphlet, again marvelling at how vibrant the colors of the envelope and stationery were. This would work! Using the website address provided, he sent an advance deposit of half the total sum to reserve his space with the Aboriginal Healers. He may have lost an ex-wife, but he was going to walk again.

After identifying Milah’s body in The Royal Melbourne Hospital, he thanked her briefly and left the morgue. It was a good enough day that he didn’t need the wheelchair. Squeezing the pommel of the cane, he leaned heavily on it as he hurried to get back to Neal. 

Neal waited in the hallway just outside the doors. Emotion filled the young boy’s eyes as he looked up at him. “Papa? Is it her?”

He couldn’t lie to Neal to save him the heartache. They needed to be at peace with this, and Gold never wanted to lie to his son at any rate. “It’s alright now. She is at peace.”

Seeing Neal frown as he looked down at the floor told Gold that Neal was trying to be brave and not hurt, and something welled in his chest causing Gold to take a shuddering breath. “Oh, Neal, my boy.” The tear he shed was not for Milah, but for a young boy who lost his mother too early.

He took Neal to the Bay afterwards, though walking in sand was the worst idea he’d had. It was nearly impossible with a cane, and afterwards, Gold was in such pain that he had to resort to the wheelchair again.

 

Two days later, Gold met with the Aboriginal Healers for his appointment. Only when he wheeled himself into the office, there was not a single Aborigine in sight other than the posters of the indigenous people tacky glued to the walls. The man behind the desk wasn’t even Australian. 

“Look, Sir,” the young man behind the desk said as he crossed arms and leaned forward over the desk. “I assure you, I was taught by the Aborigines, but we simply cannot help someone with your condition.”

_"My_ condition?” Gold repeated. “My condition is exactly what your pamphlet advertised an ability to heal!” He slammed his hand onto the desktop only wishing he had brought his cane. “It claimed to heal pain. I paid to have this pain healed!” He slammed his hand again but only managed to cause himself more pain.

“Sir,” the fraud repeated and enunciated his words more slowly as he spoke. “You didn’t disclose that you had such a debilitating condition. You’re ineligible for this program so I’m going to have to ask you to leave.” He stood up and waved at the door. “I can wheel you out if…”

“You will not!” Gold raised a finger to point at the fraud. If he hadn’t been stuck in the chair… if… if… 

The other man had the audacity to roll his eyes as he lifted the phone from the receiver on his desk. “Clara? Notify my next appointment that they can come early. Mister Gold can’t participate so he’s leaving.”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do!”

Clara must have sent in assistance because two nurses walked in to push Gold in the chair out of the office. “Stop! I paid for this session! I demand to be healed!”

“You can’t be, Mister Gold.”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do!” he repeated over his shoulder, shouting the whole way. His voice broke as he tried again, “Please! I need this! Please!”

After he was nearly dumped out of the building into the alleyway, Gold realized he was shaking, he was so angry. And his eyes were betraying him because he was nearly in tears. He’d spent half his life savings on this and it turned out to be a hoax! Still confined to a chair on his worse days, or in terrible pain when he could try to limp with a cane, it wasn’t getting easier. It was getting worse and soon, he knew, he’d be trapped in a chair for the rest of his days. 

He glared up at the sky and made a wish.

**David**

Several people went to find water. Killian, Regina, Jafar, and Aurora followed his lead. 

“How are you doing, Aurora?” David asked her as she walked quietly beside him. 

She was fumbling with her wedding band and had a distant look in her eyes. She didn’t answer at first, and David thought at first she was going to ignore him. But when she spoke up, her voice was distant. “I can’t help but think Philip is out there. He’s alive, I just know it. He went to the tail section of the plane to use the bathroom.”

David nodded as they walked. “There’s going to be a memorial service tonight. You can…”

Aurora cut him off with a sharp word. “No, Doctor. I believe that the tail section is alive somewhere on this island and they think we’re dead. I… I want to find my husband.” 

What could David say? Offer assurances that could end up proving to be false if they ever came across the tail section? Meanwhile, David had been pursuing a ghost of a man he knew was dead. He’d seen and identified his corpse after all, yet part of him believed the man might actually be alive. 

So, David didn’t say anything more. He patted Aurora’s shoulder in support. It was all he could do at the moment.

 

David was distracted. He kept looking for Spencer, half trying to convince himself that it was only a hallucination, half hoping in a way that Spencer was alive just so he could prove to himself he wasn’t going crazy on the island. And after that talk with Gold, it was all he could think about. 

In Australia, he had gone to claim his father’s body. He had gone into the morgue and waited as the mortician unzipped the body bag to show him still face of Albert Spencer. He knew what he knew. _Dehydrated. Post traumatic stress. Exhaustion. He’s dead. I know this._

This also brought up the question of where Jefferson was as he uncharacteristically wasn’t tagging along. “Anyone seen Jefferson lately? He’s usually always around.” _In everyone’s business,_ he didn’t add. 

“I saw him last night,” Jafar said. “The boars…”

“Aye,” Killian agreed. “This morning, he was just kind of sitting around, not doing anything while everyone else gathered firewood.”

A growing sense of doom was spreading among the survivors, especially after that woman drowned earlier that morning, but Jefferson had been the one to cynically tell David that they weren’t going to be rescued, that he needed to wake up and realize where he was trapped and focus on survival.

A motion to his side caught David’s attention as the others were remarking on random topics. David wasn’t listening any longer. 

He took off running, certain he saw Albert Spencer again.

**Gold**

He did not follow along with the others. He knew he was needed in the jungle still. So with three empty canteens strapped across his chest, Gold walked pointedly in one direction. 

There were cliffs ahead. He’d never seen them with his own eyes, but the island told him they were there, and he knew it was true.

There was a cry out of fear ahead and Gold continued forward at a leisurely pace until the trees thinned enough that he could see the bluff ahead. A hand held on. Gold slung the canteens off his chest, dropped them to the ground, and kneeled as he took the wrist in hand. “Need help?” he called over the cliff to see David looking up at him.

“Yes! Help me! Please!” he cried.

Gold nodded and reached over to grasp David’s other flailing hand and pulled backwards, legs straining, but he grinned up at the sky, basking at being able to feel without debilitating pain. 

David clambered over the precipice and sprawled onto the flat rock, gasping up at the sky. “You saved me,” he panted.

Gold nodded once. “Chasing after your White Rabbit led to this?” he asked. David laughed. “These people would be lost without their hero.”

David held up a hand to stop him. “I’m not a hero. I don’t have what it takes.”

Gold sat up and raised a knee to prop his forearm on it as he looked out across the valley beyond. “Everything happens for a reason, David. The island is trying to show you something, and if you can find a way to listen, you’ll find what you’ve been searching for.”

David wasn’t laughing any longer, but there was a change in him as he sat up and nodded.

**David**

David listened to Gold and followed at a slower pace this time. He had nearly flown off that cliff because he had been running too fast. Slower, he followed the pull he felt as Gold had suggested earlier in the day. _’There is magic in this island. Find a way to listen,_ he had said.

They walked around one turn, then the next, until he looked to his left. An opening to a cave was just there. He stepped up to it and poked his head in. The sound of running water met his ears. A stream. Reaching out, David grinned as he felt the water running swiftly across his open palm. 

And then he saw something to the side, almost out of sight as it was half hidden under clothing, toys, and a small section of the outer wall of the plane. A coffin. Albert Spencer’s coffin. And it was propped open with nothing inside but a silken pillow. 

David frowned at it only for a moment before he blinked and shook his head. The sound of the running water was louder than the need to analyze the coffin or the potential hallucinations. He knew what he knew. Maybe the island was trying to show him something, as Gold said. And now because he’d listened, the other forty five would have water. _I didn’t fail, Dad,_ he thought to himself as he turned away from the coffin and reached for his canteen.

 

After he and Gold returned to the beach and distributed water from their canteens, David checked on Emma to see that Cora’s ministrations had helped hydrate the young woman. She claimed that she felt her baby moving, as well. 

David instructed her to drink a full canteen of water before going to sleep that night. To not worry about using it up since they had a spring now.

 

A memorial was being held for the victims that hadn’t survived the crash. The fuselage was still burning, but thankfully the smells of the bodies within had diminished enough that people could come closer. Emma was reading off names and birthdates and country of origin from the victims’ passports. It was all they could do for them.

Gold and Neal were handling the boar, giving out skewers of the roasted meat as people approached for their share. Thanks were given. 

Graham had taken over making sure the water supply was appropriately portioned out. One man argued with Graham assuming the younger man was hoarding the water for certain people and shorting others. A fight broke out and David intervened. “A woman died this morning just going for a swim and now you’re ready to hang him?” He shook his head as he looked at all of the people standing there listening to him. Silently absorbing everything he said as if he was their leader. Despite this, he continued. “If we can’t work together, live together, we’re going to die alone.” Looks of shame passed between those involved.

“In the morning, we’ll go the spring and fill as many containers as possible. Anyone that doesn’t go along needs to do something to help out. Everyone needs to be involved.”

Killian sang at the conclusion of the memorial. _Amazing Grace._ It was the only song appropriate enough which he knew, he said, and tears of those in observance followed.

As David approached Neal and Gold for a skewer of meat, he noticed the faraway look in Gold’s eyes as he stared into the flames. David followed his gaze to see twists of metal within the dancing flames. “What is it?” David asked.

“Wheelchair,” Gold said, and smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I have something already written for much farther along in the story (involving character development and some of the other characters that haven't shown up yet!!) and I just want to skip ahead and post it, but I'm trying to remain patient and stick with the outline here. :) Your kudos and comments are really encouraging for more frequent updates! Thank you so much for reading!_
> 
> _-AA  
> _


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter chapter for you today, but I was pretty pleased with sharing more of Robyn and Alice's beginnings here. Hope you enjoy.

[](https://ibb.co/dYPyrK)

**_Flashback_ **

**Alice**

The party had been going on for eons and Alice was getting bored. She was only there because _Mummy Dearest_ demanded she make an appearance. If she could be anywhere else, she would have flown out the door, the window, grabbed the arm of anyone leaving the hotel’s banquet room with a disguise over her face. Anything for the chance to get the hell out. But Eloise Gardner knew her daughter too well and posted her guard dogs at the doors. Any time Alice neared, she would get a gentle (with stern undertone), _’Now, dear Alice, you’re wanted by the So-In-So’s. Don’t disappoint Mrs. Gardner,’_ and Alice would roll her eyes nearly out of her head as she veered off towards whomever Mummy needed impressing. 

Alice didn’t give a fig about the family business. Ever since she was small, she wanted to be an artist or perhaps an astronaut, or a Broadway actor, or even a bloody pirate! Anything but an executive, but that didn’t bode well for the only daughter of one of the most influential women in England.

And so, Alice was at the banquet dinner. Bored. As. Hell. 

She swirled her olive in her martini glass - otherwise empty, because she’d much rather be drunk - as she sat slumped against the bar. Her boot tapped with the music and made quite a show beneath her gown. Mummy would have a thing to say about that as well if she saw, but Alice was three drinks deep and might actually tell Mummy to shove her propriety up her arse at that point. To hell with the consequences!

“You look like you’re having a blast,” a dry voice said over her shoulder as a slender arm reached just in front of her with a fresh martini. 

Alice shifted her eyes to see who was so bold to reach over her only to notice the smirking lips and twinkling, blue eyes dart towards the waitstaff door to the kitchen. “Want to get outta here?” the waitress asked. 

“Do I ever?” Alice snatched the martini, gulped half in one mouthful and set it down before hopping down from her seat. Mummy was occupied with some American dignitary at the moment, so Alice hiked up the front of her gown and snuck off to the door, the waitress right behind her. 

“I’m gonna get it later, but I don’t even care,” Alice giggled as she reached behind her to take the hand of the waitress. She’d never been offered a chance to ‘get outta’ anywhere before and she was bloody well taking it!

_**Island** _

**Killian**

It had been a full week on the island and a routine had settled in for the survivors. Skills had been figured out and jobs were performed to keep everyone busy. Fresh water was available, and despite still being trapped on an island, Killian felt optimistic. Emma was speaking to him slightly more often, but also he had found reward in his ability to catch fish to contribute to the food supply. Though Cora had attempted to use him as some sort of fish bait to prove something to her brother, she had given him a purpose.

In addition, he was glad to help with any of the organized parties in filling water bottles. If they would get moving that morning. The sun was already high and the apparent leadership on the island hadn’t made for the cave yet. 

Killian was sweating and it was running into his eyes through his long fringe. Regina and Jefferson were hovering too closely with each other, grinning and laughing over something not water-related, and Killian could feel the beginnings of a headache setting in.

“If you two are quite done fornicating with your eyes, there are people in need of water?” The rise to his accusation caught the desired effect as Regina scoffed at Killian and walked away from the two men. 

The need for water and the hike to get to the cave served to distract him from the problem of his dwindling supply in his pocket. But that was a matter to worry over later. For now, he was a fulfilled, happy, free man! Even if trapped on an island with others who would certainly judge him for being an addict if they knew.

David was in the lead in the walk towards the caves, Regina behind him, and Killian and Gold in the rear. The older man who had come back with the dead boar and fed the forty six survivors was quiet, but friendly enough. His son never came along on the walks, however. If Killian had a son on an island, he’d think he’d insist the boy come along. “Oi, mate,” Killian said aloud. “Your boy…”

“Neal,” Gold supplied with a side eye toward Killian. 

“Aye. Why do you not let him come along?” 

“Do ye have a problem with my parenting?” Gold asked shortly as he stepped over a tree root.

Killian shook his head and ran his hand through his hair feeling the sweat in his locks. Perhaps he ought to cut it soon; it was getting longer than he was accustomed. “No, of course not. Apologies.”

His boot crunched onto something soft and Gold shot out a hand barring Killian’s progress forward. “What?” he started.

Gold’s eyes lowered. “Don’t move,” he whispered.

Something flew too close to Killian’s face and he swatted it.

“I said, don’t move!” Gold insisted through gritted teeth as he glared at Killian. 

“What’s the hold up?” David called from farther ahead with Regina looking back at them as well. 

“Bees!” Gold said back over his shoulder. “Don’t move or the hive will snap…”

David approached slowly with a duffel bag in hand. “Stay still. I’ll try to cover the hive.”

At this point, Killian had likely thirty to half a hundred bees crawling on his face and arms and he was on the verge of panic. “I have a problem with bees,” he said nervously.

“Just keep calm,” Gold insisted as he watched David.

“If I had the ability to keep calm, I wouldn’t have a bloody problem!” Killian protested.

David was moving far too slowly for Killian. Something stung at his neck, and Killian smacked it. His foot shifted and he sunk further into it. An angry hum sounded and Regina screamed. 

Killian ran, arms flailing and slapping at himself as sting after sting made him more aware of the frailty of the human body than he’d ever realized.

David and Regina had yanked off their shirts, Regina’s upper half only covered by a brassiere. David flung his shirt through the air at any remaining bees. Regina ran into the cave, ranting in angry curses.

 

“You are an idiot!” Regina seethed minutes later as David squeezed a tube of antibiotic cream on a red welt on her arm.

“Aye, a bloody idiot. Sorry,” Killian said, and meant it even if he was stung several dozen times. “I found this outside the cave.” Regina’s shirt was in his hand as he offered it to her. She snatched it away and winced again as David squeezed at a spot on her back. 

Killian wondered what would happen if he took a hit with the venom in his body. The pouch in his pocket felt heavy and constantly on his mind. He itched and hurt all over, but he wasn’t about to sneak off with how mad the others were at him. 

So, Killian was staying put and suffering with them. 

Part of the plane had crashed outside of the cave and he was going through it to see what might be salvageable there. Gold was doing the same, but Killian suspected the older man was following him for some reason.

“You following me, Mate?” Killian asked suspiciously as he dragged a sheet of metal back. 

“I know you,” Gold said from the other side of the wreckage.

Killian’s eyebrows went up as he waited, wondering what he meant.

 _“The Villains,_ right? The… the band…?”

Killian’s shoulders relaxed as he grinned triumphantly. “Finally! Aye. Yes. I’m from _The Villains._ Bass and vocals.” Maybe his chest was puffed out a little and he was beaming more proudly than he ever had before over recognition, but he didn’t care.

Gold nodded as he bent to pick something up and toss it with a thud to the Keep pile. “I had a coworker that played your… your music at work. Had a poster in his cubicle. You had more,” he gestured towards his eyes, “eye makeup in the poster.”

Killian bobbed his head, amused. “Aye, well, my brother Liam was once the head of the band and he insisted we had to look like pirates and pirates wear eyeliner.”

Gold nodded with an, “Ah,” and Killian thought he might have seen regret in the man’s face. Maybe he was divulging too much information, but Gold spoke up again. “And how long has it been since you’ve played your guitar?”

Killian shrugged. “Eight days and eleven hours.” 

“You miss it.” When Killian nodded, Gold added, “You will play it again.”

“Hey! Come over here! We found something!” David called from the caves. 

Killian tossed down the metal he had been moving, and with Gold, headed to the cave entrance. Regina was standing across from David with her arms crossed as she looked down at something. David glanced over his shoulder and pointed. “Two bodies,” he said in explanation. “A man and a woman. They’ve been here for probably forty, fifty years based on the deterioration of their clothes and the decay of the bodies.”

Killian stretched his neck to see over the indentation in the cave floor. There were in fact two age-darkened shapes of bodies, their arms and legs entwined with one another in what appeared to be a lover’s pose. Dead for years, evidently. “Is this their tomb?” Killian asked with his lip raised. He suddenly felt as if he was intruding.

Gold squatted beside the bodies and reached between them. “Adam and Eve,” he said simply.

“Mate!” Killian said, startled. “What are you doing?”

Gold ignored the question and pulled back his hand with a small pouch between his fingers. He set it in his other hand and pulled open a drawstring which cracked under the movement. He peered inside and tilted the bag out into his other hand. Two pieces of something resembling rocks fell out. One black, one white. 

“What the hell are those?” Regina asked. 

_**Flashback** _

**Alice**

“Who cares where you go? It’s not like you’re the Queen’s daughter are you?” There was a flirty way about this waitress. She was bolder than the others hired for these type of events. That was an American for you, Alice thought. She rather liked this American, too. Her blonde hair was swept back into a low pony and her glasses made her look almost as if she’d be quieter than she actually was, but her attitude was startling, different, and refreshing. 

Alice bit her lip, contemplating keeping exactly who she was to herself. Maybe for a little longer anyway. She inclined her chin and posed in her best Elizabeth the II. “Maybe _We_ are the Queen’s daughter.”

The waitress’s eyes danced in amusement. “Well.” She did her best curtsy. “My Lady. Allow me to introduce myself. Robyn of House Mills of the Rebellious Colonies of the Americas. At your service.”

“Rise Miss? Robyn of House Mills?” Robyn nodded with another curtsy.

Alice chuckled and tilted her head as she watched the light sparkle in Robyn’s eyes. “So what’s an American doing here all the way across the pond at this banquet? Surely, you’ve got better things to do.”

Robyn shrugged. “Just trying to get out from under my mom’s thumb. I’m at the University on a summer exchange program. And yes. It’s just Miss. You can call me Robyn.”

Alice bit her lip and eyed the door to the banquet room. She understood well about being under the thumb of oppression. But Robyn was still looking at her with hopeful eyes and a sense of waiting for her name, too. Alice wasn’t one for waiting. Direct and to the point, Alice shot out her hand. “I’m Alice. Alice Gardner-Jones.”

“Oh shit!” Robyn exclaimed before slapping her hand over her mouth and glancing back to the door and ducking her head. Whispering she added. “You’re _her_ daughter! I’m so sorry! I didn’t…”

Alice was laughing immediately, shaking her head and reaching for Robyn’s hand to remove from her mouth. Clasping Robyn’s hands in her own, she smiled at the other woman. “I’m nothing like my mother. Don’t worry. I’m more like my papa anyway. But he’s…” Her voice trailed off as her eyes dropped to their linked hands. “I haven’t seen my papa since I was a little girl when my mother fought him and won custody.”

“Damn. And I thought I had it rough…” Robyn leaned against a shelf of napkins and cutlery as she frowned at Alice who leaned forward slightly to follow her movement.

Alice shook her head a little sadly. “Enough of that rubbish. I don’t want to spoil the only good moment I’ve had this night.” She squeezed Robyn’s hand, hopeful. “So… University, aye?”

Robyn nodded, but there was something in the way she was looking back at Alice that told her she had ruined the moment anyway. She was always too open and spewed out anything that came to mind, half-drunk or not.

“Bloody hell,” she muttered and wiped a hand across her forehead. “I always do this. Please forgive me. Mother wouldn’t like me being back here. I really should go…”

Robyn nodded. “No, no. I get you. Oppressive mothers.” She shrugged and sighed as they both turned back toward the door. “How about another drink?”

“I’d like that,” Alice grinned.

_**Island** _

The sound of screaming met her ears and Alice was running back toward the beach. It sounded like Robyn’s voice. “Bloody hell, bloody damn, fucking... Hell!” she mumbled to herself as her feet pounded on the sand and her mind raced as she wondered what was going on. If Robyn was hurt or being attacked by a boar - if any were still around - or a squid, or… what did this island have for wildlife? She didn’t know. But if Robyn was hurt, Alice would be lost!

“Robyn!” she screamed as she burst through the treeline and onto the beach. 

There was cloud of sand exploding on the beach which told Alice where to run, but she stopped again when she noticed there was another woman there. And they were fighting! “Robyn!” Alice screamed again as her hands fidgeted wildly, unsure of what to do or who that other woman was that swung her hand toward Robyn’s beautiful face. _No! Not her face!_

Two men ran up, one grabbing Robyn from behind and dragging her back by the arms, and the other grabbing the other woman back. The two women glared daggers at each other.

“Hey!” the American man yelled first. “Cut the crap! What the hell is going on?” _Jefferson! That’s his name!_ She remembered he was the one with the hoard of stuff in his own little hidey hole.

The other man was Jafar and he was good with the radio and electronics. He was holding that other woman who was bleeding from a gash in her forehead. “It is okay. Cora! Stop fighting me! What happened?” 

Alice felt invisible. Why had no one looked at her as she had been panicking, screaming for Robyn to stop? Not even Robyn seemed to realize she was there as Robyn yanked her arms out of Jefferson’s grasp. “That is my goddamn watch!” She pointed at Cora’s wrist. The other woman was in fact wearing Robyn’s gold watch. It matched Alice’s. Looking down at her own wrist, she saw how the gold glittered in the sunlight and she thought how silly a concept like time was on an island where no one could possibly be late for anything. It was just a watch. It wasn’t worth a fight, was it?

Cora was still breathing heavily as she snatched the watch off her wrist and threw it at Robyn who caught it. “Fine! Who cares about a stupid watch? I found it and thought it was pretty, that’s all.”

“Are we cool now?” Jefferson asked, still on guard, obviously by the set of his shoulders as he glared between the two women.

Cora touched her forehead and frowned at the blood on her fingers. “Stay away from me,” she glared at Robyn and turned around in Jafar’s arms who kept one arm around her shoulders as he ushered her away. 

Robyn glared at Jefferson behind her who raised his hands up in surrender and shook his head as he backed away from her. 

“Robyn?” Alice said with a quiet squeak, wondering if she was still invisible.

Robyn’s eyes shot upwards and finally noticed her. Her shoulders dipped and an embarrassed look crossed Robyn’s face as she jogged up the beach to approach Alice.

“She took the watch your mother gave me,” she said in explanation as she approached. 

Alice couldn’t say, ‘It’s just a bloody watch.’ It was important to Robyn. She understood now. Her mother had given it to Robyn the day she agreed to work for Gardner Corp in exchange for her permission to marry her daughter. The day Robyn became one of her mother’s Trusted Thirteen. The day that Robyn had begun to spiral down into her mother’s control and no longer was the sweet, rebellious American bad-girl that Alice had fallen in love with.

“No one is going to take what’s mine,” Robyn said to Alice as she touched her chin.

**_Flashback_ **

**Alice**

Alice paced the foyer. Around the table that held a vase of sunflowers, past the painting of starfish, around the table again, past the painting again. Over and over. She felt trapped in the penthouse apartment. Where the hell was Robyn? Every night, she was away working later and later. Should she call Mother and demand she ease up on Robyn’s schedule? 

They had only been married for six months. They were still in the honeymoon phase of their marriage. Why couldn’t they just be together and happy? But Mother would threaten Robyn’s Visa again. Or her job. Alice would be disinherited. Who gave a bloody damn? All they needed was each other. 

She would do it, she decided. As soon as Robyn got home, she’d tell her they would run away to America and Alice would be the one to get the Visa this time. Maybe they would go live near Robyn’s mother instead. She had to be better than Eloise Gardner. 

The front door clicked shut and Alice spun around on her heel. “Rob--” she started but her mouth dropped open as she noticed the blood on Robyn’s pantsuit. “Robyn?” she asked instantly worried. “Are you bleeding? Are you hurt?” She meant to help, but Robyn held up a weary hand. 

“Please, Alice, darling. Just… let me shower. And burn these clothes. Please, don’t ask.” She looked exhausted. Dark circles were under her eyes and her hair wasn’t in the neat bun it usually was. She dropped her purse on the table making the sunflower vase rock precariously. Alice grabbed it to keep it level and watched as Robyn slowly walked to their bedroom. 

When the shower was running, Alice finally walked into the steamy bathroom. Slipping out of her own clothes, she stepped over the edge of the tub, one hand on the glass partition to keep from slipping. Robyn’s long hair was running red rivulets down her back and along the curve of her buttocks. Her head was dipped and one hand kept her propped up against the tile wall. She was utterly exhausted.

“What happened? Please tell me,” she tried as she touched Robyn’s back. 

“I can’t. I told you not to ask me.” Robyn’s voice was low and with the noise of the water, Alice almost missed her words, but she understood loud and clear that once again, she was being left out.

“I’m your wife! I need to know what is happening to you. What did you do?” Alice demanded, tired of being ignored as if she didn’t have a say. 

Robyn looked over her shoulder at Alice with the saddest expression in her eyes. “I do whatever your mother demands of me.” She turned her face away and reached for the soap.

**David**

Back on the beach, the other survivors circled around to receive a bottle of water and news. David had been elected leader, much to his protest of such a thing, but it seemed to work. Whether he wanted it or not, people stopped what they were doing to hear him speak. They came to him for direction and even asked him what they should do. When he attempted to stand back and let someone else take the reins, Anton went so far as to tell him, “But… you’re our leader.”

Aside from the fact that Anton was afraid of Regina for being a criminal and for killing the Marshal, the rest of the survivors seemed okay around her. When she gave orders, they weren’t disputed. David, however, didn’t mind sharing the leadership role with Regina. They seemed to work well together over the past week.

And so, David and Regina explained what they had found in the cave and the plan they came up with. 

“We’ll need to move to the caves,” David announced. “We will have shelter and a source of fresh water there.”

“I am not leaving the beach!” Jafar exploded with an armful of firewood. “We leave the beach, the fire signals won’t be lit and we miss the opportunity of being seen! That admits defeat and I will not admit any such thing!” He stomped out of the crowd and David nodded accepting this. It was bound to happen.

“Anyone else?” he asked.

“I… I don’t want to leave the beach,” Cora added. “The campfires at night keep the signal burning. There are wild animals in the jungle. I just want to go home.”

“Yeah!” someone else agreed. “How will they find us if we all move inland?”

“But I want shelter! I’m sick of having sand on me and I’m red as a lobster!”

Regina had been more right about this than David had realized.

David and Regina looked at each other and Regina nodded as they came to their pre-planned Plan B. Regina spoke up. “Those of you that want to stay on the beach can stay. I’ll stay with you.”

“And those that want to go to the caves can go with me,” David agreed. 

With this decision, Anton, Gold and Neal, the dog, Alice and Robyn, Killian, and several others went with David to the caves. 

**Regina**

Regina stayed on the beach with Jefferson, Emma, Jafar, Aurora, Cora and Graham and the others that preferred to remain on the familiar grounds of the past week. David knew that many would find it safer there, plus they wouldn’t have to carry half a gallon of the required water intake forty six people would need per day. He said that it only made sense that everyone should move to the cave and the surrounding jungle. She shook her head, said she knew they wouldn’t all like the change of location into the jungle where that smoke monster was. She hadn’t even decided herself. But David had brought up the point to Regina while still at the cave: _‘Let the people have the choice. They will be more willing to cooperate, to keep the peace if they have a choice.’_

While she had made her choice as well, she was still looking between the running water and the dead bodies entombed there. _’How did you find this place?_ Regina asked. 

David shrugged. _’Luck.’_ There was a certain look he sent to Gold, but Regina was barely paying attention. They had fresh water and they needed to get the people from the beach hydrated or they would soon start dropping like Emma had the day before.

The voice that spoke up brought her back from her reverie. “Just to be clear, I don’t give a rat’s ass about sides. We’re still trapped on a fucking island no matter where we are,” Jefferson drawled with his arms crossed over his chest as he watched Regina walk past him through the sand after David left.

She only cast the briefest of glances at him. “Afraid we’re going to raid your treasure trove?” Regina asked as she passed Jefferson. 

“Hardly. I’ve got enough stashed away in that jungle that I could survive anywhere.” He sounded sure of himself as he chuckled and began to follow behind her and that only irked Regina more. 

She wasn’t mad at Jefferson, she was mad at David, at herself, at her situation and Jefferson was the one in her way. She stopped and snapped her eyes back at him. “Since you’re so resourceful, Jefferson, why don’t you get to work on those campfires? They aren’t going to light themselves.” 

That did the trick, apparently, because he stopped in his pursuit and a frown crossed the usual carefree expression of his usual demeanor. “Of course, Your Majesty.” Jefferson dipped his head as he kept his eyes on her just waiting to see her glare at him. _Back to that title again?_ He knew she hated it when he called her that just to get under her skin.

But she wasn’t about to let him have the satisfaction. “That’s more like it,” she purred. The antagonizer, he was, she could feel his eyes on her backside as she walked away from him. Let him look. She was in charge, not him.

The others had gotten straight to their own duties they had been working on for the past couple of days. Graham was helping to distribute the rest of the water with Aurora’s help. He carried a duffle bag full and Aurora would give two to each person they approached. The woman was so friendly, but she carried a sadness with her that Regina noticed. She was so optimistic that her husband was still alive with the tail-section survivors, but was that a trace of doubt lingering below the surface? 

Regina felt only pity for the woman. Didn’t she know the Fates didn’t let people have their happy endings? That was why she and her ill-fated husband had been separated just moments before the plane ripped apart. 

That was why Regina had been separated from Daniel just moments before they were going to run away together. Permanently. Daniel wasn’t coming back. Aurora’s husband wasn’t coming back. 

Graham reached out to catch Aurora’s arm as she tripped over one of the survivor’s legs. Aurora smiled while fanning her face in embarrassment. Graham shook his head, laughing, and said something most likely reassuring to her. 

Such kindness these people bestowed on one another. Regina didn’t deserve that kind of kindness. And they wouldn’t give her kindness either. Merely the courtesy that every other survivor got simply because they were stuck together. She was a murderer. They all knew she killed the Marshal by now and that she had done something else to warrant her arrest prior to the flight. Even if they listened to her and stayed on the beach with her, they knew what she was. 

Keeping her head high, Regina continued walking past Graham and Aurora to find Cora sitting by herself. “Mind if I join you?” Regina asked. 

Cora looked up with a somber expression on her own face, the red streak across her forehead bright and angry, and gestured toward the empty space beside her. A fire had been built and Cora and Regina sat in silence staring at it.

_**Flashback** _

**Alice**

This was it. She was finally going to be free. Free from the oppression of her mother. Free from Robyn Mills who didn’t seem to love her anymore after three years of marriage since she was too busy being one of her mother’s Thirteen. Alice was going to Australia for a new beginning. A new life. And she was finally going to be her own woman. 

It was terrifying and exciting all at once. She tried not to focus on the other emotions threatening to flare up and cripple her. Feeling like a caged bird all her life was not the story Alice wanted to live by. There was a whole world out there waiting for her to explore and she was going to go absolutely bonkers if she didn’t go immediately. There should be no regrets in life, _[Starfish,]_ and she deserved to be happy! That’s what her papa had told her long ago.

Once upon a time, she thought that happiness was in Robyn, but her mother had ruined everything as usual. First her papa was taken from her, now her beloved wife had been taken from her in the form of a complete personality change since they had married. She didn’t even know who the woman in her bed at night was anymore.

Taking a deep breath, Alice nodded in determination that she would be doing this for herself, and bent her knees to pick up her suitcase by the handle. Without looking back, she left the apartment building and entered the cab which would take her to Heathrow and her new life of adventure.

 

Alice had been to the London-Heathrow airport numerous times, but never to fly. Never, never. Only to meet clients who were flying in for a meeting, or to escort her mother as she flew the coop to some exotic land beyond the British Isles. But never Alice. Always trapped. 

But not anymore! 

Her heels clicked along the floor as she marvelled at the shops. Held up a hand with a polite, “No thank you,” to the alcohol salesman. And an eager, “Yes, please!” to the perfumerie woman to catch a whiff of the smells of France. 

“Maybe I should go to France instead of Australia?” she mused as she inhaled deeply of the smell. It was simply marvellous! 

So were the items from the shop with things like neck pillows and airline snacks! Not that she’d been so deprived not to have anything she could ever want back home, but why should she need a neck pillow when she had a full sized pillow? She wouldn’t! But now with the prospect of a long flight to Australia, maybe she did need a neck pillow! And all the snacks! But First Class had snacks, and champagne and martinis…

Alice frowned at the thought of martinis, and shrugged. No thoughts like that today, she decided and snatched a pale blue neck pillow from the rack. Not that it reminded her of someone’s eyes at all, but she just fancied the color, that was all.

A hand darted in front of her with a credit card shoved into the credit card reader. Alice shot a suspicious look to her side to see an abashed Robyn attempt a smile at her. “Hi,” Robyn said quietly.

Alice remained quiet as she tucked her neck pillow under her arm and dragged her carry-on luggage behind her. She noticed Robyn had one as well. “What… um… what are you doing here?” she asked as she eyed the luggage.

Robyn pulled Alice to the side out of the foot traffic in the bustling airport. “Look, I know I’ve been shitty to you. Just awful, I know.” She shook her head as she kept earnest eye-contact with Alice and reached for her hand. “I don’t want to lose you. You’re the only thing that matters to me. Without you, my job means nothing. I don’t care what happens to me. All I care about is you, Alice. I know that you’re leaving… me. Please, give me a chance to make up for… for everything.” She pulled Alice’s hand to her lips and kissed her fingers.

When Alice didn’t say anything, Robyn continued. “I’ll go anywhere with you. As long as we’re together, we only need each other. Nothing else matters in the world but you and me. Please give me another chance. I love you.” She kissed her fingers again and tucked Alice’s hand to her cheek. “I love you so much.”

Alice gulped and stepped closer, wetness in her eyes nearly obscuring her vision. After swiping at her eyes, she glanced around themselves but didn’t see anyone else she recognized. Maybe she could trust Robyn. Again. Maybe it would all be okay. Maybe they could be free together. “I love you, too.”

**Killian**

He felt bad about not staying on the beach with Emma, but he felt he needed to go to the caves to continue helping search through the wreckage there. And it would give him the chance of being alone in the jungle without anyone seeing what he was doing. When he was done with the clean up and his stash was depleted, he could always go back to the beach to check on her. See if she missed him…

A hand tapped his shoulder and Killian was startled to find Gold regarding him with a nod at the pocket in which Killian’s hand was holding the baggie.

“I know,” Gold started in a hushed tone.

“You know?” Killian repeated. “What do you bloody know?”

“I know that you’re addicted to heroine. I’ve seen you in the woods. I’ve seen how you act.” Gold waited for a response as Killian looked away, suddenly defensive. 

“It’s my bloody body and we’re on an island with no laws. What do you care what I do?” Killian hissed back, his fist tight around the pouch.

Gold snorted through his nose. “Fine. Do as you wish to your own body. Just know that feeding the addiction now will only make it worse for you later when you run out.” He grinned as he leaned forward. “Wouldn’t you prefer to be in control of your inner demons than allowing them control over you?”

Killian was still glaring. How did he know anything about him or what inner demons he had? Gold didn’t know that Killian had never wanted this and the man didn’t know him at all! What right did he have?

“Tell you what,” Gold said on a sigh as a grin began to form upon his face. “If you give up the heroine, the island will give you back your guitar.”

Killian was stumped. “What?” he asked incredulously. “What d’ye mean?” Who was the one who was bloody high here?

Gold explained as he leaned against the base of a tree. “The island has ways of providing what we need, but we have to give the island something in return. There is always a price.” 

Killian fidgeted. Scratched behind his ear. Glanced at the others who were working. They were all working hard, too. Productive members of this non-society, they were. 

He cleared his throat and squeezed the baggie again. It still had enough for a couple weeks if he paced himself. But… being in control, not letting the demons take him down. And his guitar. That was what really freed him. Music. Not the drugs. It would be hard, he knew, but he was strong. Wasn’t he?

Nodding, Killian pulled his fist from his pocket and opened it over Gold’s waiting hand. The shorter man tilted his head to look up and Killian followed his gaze. 

There, stuck in the branches above their heads, was a familiar black case with band stickers placed haphazardly upon it. And Killian grinned.

**_Island_ **

**Alice**

The sound of guitar music and soft singing filled the air. A few candles were lit to mark a path from the piece of plane wreckage that had been cleared away from the opening of the cave and up to the cave. It seemed almost like a perfect, romantic, island getaway if not for the other people lounging about or the threat of wild boar. But Alice had wanted to get to know the other survivors, to socialize, to make friends even. There was no room for complaint here. She was happy.

Robyn’s fingers were entwined with Alice’s as they walked slowly upon the soft peaty ground to find their own secluded space. 

“What is that he’s singing, do ya think?” Alice asked with a grin on her face as she looked up at Robyn.

“Um, sounds like Willie Nelson to me. If Willie was British. And young. And sober.” Robyn giggled.

Alice bumped her shoulder into Robyn’s. “Oi, all that and he still sounds like Willie Nelson. Must’ve had voice training, I s’pose.”

Robyn shrugged and turned on her heel to face Alice. Both her hands were twined with Robyn’s now as they both grinned at each other. “It’s like the honeymoon we never got to have.”

Alice glanced up at the stars that shined down through the tree canopy and nodded. She bounced on her heels. “Mhm. Only a few years late.”

“I’m sorry it took a plane crash for that to happen,” Robyn said quietly.

But Alice shook her head and drew Robyn nearer so that her hands looped around her waist. “We’re finally free here, ya know?”

“Finally,” Robyn breathed into Alice’s hair. “You’re so right.” And Alice felt Robyn tremble under her hands. “Finally.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You have probably figured out by now that several people in this fic are not related as they are in canon. Killian on the island is not Alice's father here even if they share the last name of Jones. Cora is not Regina's mother even if Regina still had a mother like Cora. Graham is Cora's step brother. Weird? There will be more relations that are canon to unfold in the future, however, and I'm really excited about that reveal._   
>  _Please drop a comment or leave kudos. It helps! Thank you for reading!_

**Author's Note:**

> _Please let me know your thoughts, if you found major errors I need to look at, or want to see something specific unfold in future chapters. You're welcome to guess which Lost character is associated with the OUAT character, too, if you'd like. I'd love to see your guesses, but I may not confirm or deny just yet._
> 
> _I'm excited to share this with you all as it's my first fic that has included this massive number of characters. It's a challenge, but I hope you're enjoying it as much as I am in writing it. Again, leave a comment, a heart, kudos, or whatever. It helps encourage updates! Thank you!_


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